boston twp.:The first time Helen Johnson had someone serenade her with Down by the Old Mill Stream, it was her late husband Albert, who was down on one knee, proposing marriage with the song.The second time was Saturday, when Johnson’s family gathered from four states to meet her at the Everett Road Covered Bridge in the Cuyahoga Valley National Park to help celebrate her 95th birthday.The barbershop quartet Eu4ria was waiting as Johnson, escorted by her granddaughter Leslie Ann Wagner, approached the bridge. Dressed in red vests and straw boaters, the quartet began the serenade as a surprised Johnson beamed with excitement when she realized it was her children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren who were standing inside the covered bridge.“Oh, I can’t believe it,” she said.Johnson’s actual birthday was Wednesday, when she told her daughter, Helen Thorpe of Akron, that she got out of bed, put her feet on the floor and said, “I made it.”Wagner has been planning the surprise for weeks and said the covered bridge over the stream seemed to be the perfect location because of the song’s significance to her grandmother.Johnson, who lives in a retirement community in Copley Township, came to Akron in 1955 with her husband, the Rev. Albert E. Johnson, and together they founded the Highview Avenue Baptist Church in Akron and the First Baptist Church in Green and served at the First Baptist Church of Tallmadge.In addition, Johnson was a registered nurse, and retired in 1981 after 25 years as head nurse at Plant No. 2 of Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co.She credits her longevity to three things: “I put the Lord first in my life. I tried to eat right, and I exercised every day. I still do,” she said. A widow since 1994, Johnson has three children, six grandchildren and 11 great-grandchildren. The family spent time on the bridge sharing favorite stories and memories of Johnson, and the quartet finished the celebration with its version of Amazing Grace.Bigger surprises were in store, however. The family headed off to a birthday dinner at Samira restaurant in Cuyahoga Falls. where television weatherman Dick Goddard was waiting to surprise Johnson.Johnson is a big fan of Goddard’s, and when Wagner asked whether he would make a special appearance at the party, he was happy to oblige and even joined the family for dinner. When Wagner told Goddard that her grandmother turned 95, he told her, “You know, she’s 35 in Celsius.”Lisa Abraham can be reached at 330-996-3737 or at labraham@thebeaconjournal.com.