Reports of the devastation and displacement in Texas wrought by Hurricane Ike played on television and computer screens all weekend long.
But its aftermath left a most unfortunate and unpredictable tragedy in St. Louis.
As the floodwaters rose in a U. City neighborhood because of heavy rain, few would have fathomed that before the weather broke they would be mourning the loss of Louise Bryant and Willie Johnson.
The elderly couple was attempting to safeguard a vehicle from water damage Sunday morning when both were swept away in the water and drowned.
Bryant’s daughter Angela Holland, who lives in South City, talked with neighbors to learn about what happened on the street where she was raised.
Holland was told that at about 7:30 a.m. Sunday, water came over the fence and filled up the driveway and spilled over into the street. Bryant and Johnson were trying to save her Chrysler 300 from sustaining damage by driving the vehicle out of the water. The car stalled. Bryant and Johnson attempted to manually push the car, but were overpowered by the tide.
“It happened so fast all of this water that came out of nowhere,” Bryant’s daughter Angela Holland said. “Neighbors saw them one minute and had to go and tend to their own catastrophes.”
Later in the evening, a neighbor discovered Willie’s lifeless body, which had floated five houses down.
Holland believes that Johnson, who is blind and in ill health, fell and then Bryant fell trying to help him.
Johnson, a native of Duckhill, Miss., had no children. His only relative in St. Louis is his niece Sharon Simms. She said, “I know that it was a shock to their family, just like mine.”
Once Johnson’s body was discovered, the police and fire departments searched diligently for Bryant.
Around noon the next day, a barge crew found Bryant’s body at the place where the River Des Peres and the Mississippi River intersect. Holland says her body had traveled nearly out of Missouri.
Holland is eternally grateful to all of the people involved the search to help locate her mother, but says she feels a special sense of appreciation to the barge crew.
“The family is very grateful for those tug boats – if she had got in the river, who knows where she would have gone,” Holland said.
“She never would have ever been found, and we would have been hurting forever. There is something spiritual in that they were working there to stop and intercede on my mom’s behalf.”
Holland is also grateful to the University City Police Department and says detectives were helpful, sympathetic and genuine in trying to help her find her mother.
In the same breath that she expressed her gratitude, there was guilt.
“I feel helpless. I’ve always helped my mom over the years,” Holland said.
“I am the only sibling here in town, and I tried to be there for my mom. When I found out this happened, I felt like I had failed her. I was supposed to look after her.”
Bryant has daughters in Chicago, New York and Mississippi and was prepared to fly to New York this weekend to visit her daughter and celebrate her 65th birthday.
Now that same daughter must fly to St. Louis to say goodbye.
Although she and Johnson were in their senior years – and Johnson, 81, was disabled – the couple showed no signs of slowing down.
“They were getting serious, she was even contemplating remarrying,” Holland said. “She had found love again, and she was living for that.”
Bryant was a mother at Friendly Temple MB Church, while Johnson attended Good Samaritan. To compromise, she went to her church in the morning and his in the afternoon twice a week. And while she was busy bowling and working as a social worker, Johnson sang to seniors who lived in area nursing homes as an effort to give back.
“She wasn’t feeble or sitting around the house,” Holland said. “She was always on the go. We could hardly ever catch her.”
Services for Willie Johnson will be held on Friday morning at Good Samaritan Church (2508 Salisbury St. St Louis, MO 63107 (314) 588-9350). A viewing will be held at 10 a.m. with the funeral immediately following at 11 a.m.
The services for Louise Bryant are pending. The funeral will be held at Friendly Temple MB Church (5544 Dr. Martin Luther King Drive). For further details, individuals are asked to contact the church at (314) 367-9700 or Hosea Gales Funeral Home at (314) 361-1000.
