In memory of Margaret Johnson – A personal memoir

In  April 2024 I attended the funeral of Margaret Johnson.

Margaret was one of the founder members of Meridian, along with her husband Alan. Margaret took up beekeeping when they first moved to Dean, having studied beekeeping at Sparsholt college. She had met Alan at a very young age through their parents as both fathers were in the Naval Corp of Constructors. They reconnected when Margaret was studying Maths at Royal Holloway in the days before most women were awarded their degrees. She told me she always felt comfortable with and valued by Alan and his friends as they did not query her interest in scientific knowledge.

On retirement Alan and Margaret attended Rothamsted Research for 6 weeks (?) studying honeybees. They invested in a beekeeping shed at their home in Dean. Margaret supported Alan in their visions for beekeeping as Meridian was born from Meon Valley Association. Alan became a President of BBKA in 1998 as well as continuing as Meridian Chairman with Margaret serving as Treasurer in the early days.

Margaret was a logical and observant thinker. It was Margaret who noticed that bees often chew the wax from the corner of frames. She thought this might help bees’ vibrations and dancing on the comb to carry through the colony more easily. I still take out the corners of foundation while I’m waxing frames. She despaired of waste and was keen that everyone cleaned frames over newspaper, saving all that precious wax for cleaning in rainwater.

Margaret could be forthright. She’d had a brain aneurysm which possibly made her fiercer, but was also very kind to me when I was ill. One of her daughters also had a virus at the same time as me but Margaret instinctively understood my need to sit for hours in the silence of their bee shed, methodically and rhythmically cutting comb, spinning honey, taking granulated oil seed rape from frames leaving a v-shape on the top bar for the bees to draw the frame again. She often shoo-ed a bemused Alan away!

Margaret was competitive. She and Beulah Cullen (Bee Inspector) spurred each other on in cleaning wax, making candles both dipped and from moulds. She shared this knowledge too. She made the older men laugh as she gruffly told them to ‘keep going’ as they presented their ‘cleaned’ wax for encouragement. She won many prizes for her candles, displays and honey and became a honey show judge. She was endlessly curious and practical. For many months I could not get my wax as clean as Margaret’s. She worked out that it was the brass pan I was using. I once complimented her on her excellent face and hand creams stating that I couldn’t get the consistency like she did. ‘Humph – not got the temperatures the same I expect’ was the response. (I still can’t achieve the consistent standard Margaret did.) Margaret was also happy to share her knowledge of beekeeping and ran courses for the younger generations alongside Alan.

Margaret was knowledgeable about our native flora , fauna and lifecycles, something else we shared. She never took George, the dog, for a walk without collecting berries for processing. She was also a campanologist, a competent seamstress and quilter, and a knowledgeable gardener; many of us have ‘bee’ plants she gave us as seedlings or cuttings.

Louise Evans, May 2024

Margaret Johnson and her husband Alan, who was a Past President of BBKA and passed away in August 2018, were both prominent members of the beekeeping community. Margaret's skills were in candle-making and rendering and making beeswax objects. I think she was a qualified honey show judge vis a vis candles.  There was a time when I thought of Margaret as a “Queen of candle-making” and a 'Master of beeswax rendering'.

We all went, including Beulah Cullen and her husband to Apimondia 2003 in Ljubljana, Slovenia, staying near Lake Bled. In 2002 I was intercepted at the Kyiv Beekeeping Research Centra by a young Ukrainian beekeeper, Valentyn Soroka. He wanted to come to UK to see how we “did” beekeeping. I got him a work permit and entry into UK but Alan and Margaret took him on as an “apprentice”. It was a good time to learn not just about British beekeeping and what could be made out of beeswax, but Alan and Margaret had a contract with Selfridges to supply honey and a range of hive products.

Tony Wolstenholme, July 2024