Walt Johansson discusses his time working on the North American X-15 program during an interview at his Pemaquid home Friday, May 19. During the early part of his professional career, beginning in the mid 1950s Johansson helped developed cutting edge technologies that informed the United States later exploration of outer space. (Sherwood Olin photo)
The few Bristol locals who haven’t met Walter N. “Walt” Johansson by now almost certainly know him by sight. Johansson is well known locally for his daily habit of walking his neighborhood on Pemaquid Harbor Road.
Johansson said he makes it a point to get outside every day, regardless of the weather.
“Every day I walk two miles,” Johansson said. “Every day. It’s free medication.”
Johansson doesn’t remember exactly when he started his walking habit – “maybe 30, 40 years ago” – but he credits the example set by one of his two sons, Eric Johansson, who got into a running group in New Jersey. He speaks to Eric regularly by phone and feels like he should always have something to report.
“My son, we frequently talk on the phone,” Walt Johansson said. “I know he is going to ask me ‘where did you walk today?’ and I better have a good answer.”
While chuckling, Eric Johansson said he is not sure how much credit he can take for his father’s walking habits. He credited his parents, Walt and Nancy Johansson, for leading by example.
Walt Johansson was a Boy Scout and later a Scout leader. He encouraged an active outdoor lifestyle. As an adult, Eric Johansson was very active as hiker and climber, and he eventually took up ultra-marathons, which he described as “mostly trail running.”
The entire family enjoyed skiing and Walt and Nancy Johansson defrayed the cost for the family of four’s lift tickets by learning first aid and volunteering to work shifts as a ski patrol. Eric fondly recalled getting up early on Saturdays with his brother so the entire family could travel to a small, family-friendly ski area in Pennsylvania.
“Every Saturday we would get up before the sun,” Eric Johansson said. “They would volunteer ski patrol for half the day … Luckily for me, when my son was born I took him to that same sweet little area in Pennsylvania. I can’t tell you how much that meant to me.”
In fact it was at a ski area in the Adirondacks that Walt Johansson crossed paths with his future wife. The two had arrived independently, with separate groups of friends. According to Eric Johansson, one or more members of one group knew one or more members of the other, so there was some cross pollination between the two.
However it happened, Walt Johansson recalls riding on a ski lift and noticing a friend he knew from church. While he was saying hello to her, she introduced him to her friend, Nancy. The couple was married in 1960 and remained so until Nancy Johansson passed away in June 2015.
Moving to Pemaquid around 1972, Walt and Nancy Johansson became such an integral part of their community, it seems hard to believe they are actually from away.
Born the only child of Swedish immigrants, Walt Johansson grew up in West Orange, N.J. After high school, he attended the Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken, N.J., where he played lacrosse and was a leading scorer. He graduated in 1956 with an engineering degree.
At the time, it was the height of the Cold War and the United States was engaged in international contest for national pride and political supremacy with the Soviet Union. Fresh out of college, Walt Johansson managed to land a job with the New Jersey-based Reaction Motors Inc., a pioneering company in the field of liquid-fueled rocket engines.
The first five years of Walt Johansson’s professional life was spent with Reaction Motors working on the groundbreaking North American X-15.
According to a National Aeronautics and Space Administration fact sheet, by the time the X-15 program was shut down in 1969, it had yielded enough data to produce 765 research reports in the areas “aerodynamics, thermodynamics, propulsion, flight controls, and the physiological aspects of high-speed, high-altitude flight.”
“The Russians were already right there but we decided we were going to make an airplane that would go faster,” Walt Johansson said. “Our development was to make an airplane that would go 4,000 miles an hour, which was pretty fast … The X-15 could not only go 4,000 mph, but a single person was the pilot. Boy I tell you, you don’t want to make any mistakes when you’re flying that speed.”
During his tenure with the company Walt Johansson oversaw the development for the XLR-99 rocket engine for the X-15, an assignment that
Maine 1st Vice District Gov. Tia Knapp presents Bristol Area Lion Walt Johansson with his 40-year pin commemorating his longtime membership in the International Lions Club in 2018. (LCN file photo)
included relocating his family temporarily to White Sands, N.M. where the engine was put through its paces.
Powered by the Reaction Motors XLR-11 engine and later the XLR-99 engines, the X-15 set and reset several speed and altitude records, ultimately achieving a highest altitude of 67.1 miles in Aug. 22, 1963 and top speed of Mach 6.7, or 4,520 mph in Oct. 3, 1967. The latter remains the highest speed ever recorded by a crewed, powered aircraft.
By that time, Walt Johansson had moved on to another company where he contributed design components for the landing gear on Surveyor 1, the first American lunar lander to touch down on the moon on June 2, 1966. Data gathered by Surveyor 1 was considered crucial for the Apollo moon landing program, which began in 1969.
“There was a big diversification on what you could pursue so you had to keep your eyes and ears open,” Walt Johansson said. “It was highly diversified so you had lots of opportunities in different areas so that was good.”
By early 1970, Walt and Nancy Johansson wanted to move away from suburban New Jersey. They considered Vermont, but ultimately chose Maine. Walt Johansson came to Pemaquid in part because he had a friend in the area, Don Chatfield.
“I had the opportunity to buy some land in this area and I knew this guy from when I worked on rocket engines in New Jersey,” Walt Johansson said. “I called him up one day and I said ‘Don, I am interested in moving to Maine and I’d like to just stay over if I could.’ He said sure, so he invited me to stay overnight, which I did … I said ‘is there any land for sale,’ and he said ‘sure, right next door, 14 acres.’ I didn’t need anything fancy, so I got it and it turned out to be very beneficial for me and my neighbors.”
In Bristol Walt Johansson commanded Bristol Boy Scout Troop 228 and became active in the Bristol Area Lions Club, serving as club president for a time and being awarded his 40-year pin in 2018.
In addition to doing paperwork for her husband’s business, Nancy Johansson worked for the Serendipity Gift Shop, Gimbel Gardens Nursery, and Miles Memorial Hospital, now LincolnHealth’s Miles Campus, in Damariscotta.
Moving to Maine, Walt put his engineering degree to work as a manufacturer’s representative for Brosites Industries, a company established by a former colleague who had gone out on his own. Brosites Industries specialized in the sales of specialized filters, diaphragms, and pipes. The business required a manufacturer’s representative with an engineer’s background and Walt Johansson fit the bill.
He spent much of the 1970s traveling to Boston for business. Some of Brosites’ products were used in the construction of the Maine Yankee in Wiscasset. Looking back now, Eric Johansson, who was 12 years old when his parents moved from suburban New Jersey to rural Pemaquid, marveled at his father’s professional chutzpah.
“Mom and Dad were kind of bold,” Eric Johansson said. “They were ready to pack it up. I don’t think they ever hesitated and I don’t think they ever looked back.”
While he is known for picking up trash along the roadside during his walks, Walt Johansson said his walks are a chance to connect with his neighbors and stay in touch with his neighborhood as much as a means of exercise.
“Walking, just plain walking, exercises the body, but you see other people you know every day,” he said. “Usually you have communication, whatever is a common interest, so therefore I find it a benefit for so many reasons.”
The 45-year member of the Lions Club also uses his walks as a chance to sell raffle tickets. Year in year out, Walt Johansson was one of the Bristol Area Lions Club’s top sellers when it came to raffle tickets. While other Lions took turns manning a table outside of C.E. Reilly & Son in New Harbor to drum up business, Walt Johansson was given his own roll of tickets, which he sold to his neighbors during his daily walks.
“Well you had different competitions and things, but all that integrated into interconnecting with people,” he said.
Walt Johansson makes it as a point to wear a bright fluorescent vest during his walks and he carries a device that helps pick up trash he finds on the side of the road. The biggest danger he has come across is not people or cars, but dogs. He’s been bitten four times over the years.
The last time he was bitten was about a year ago just down the road from his house. The dog owners were very embarrassed, he said. Now, if he is going to walk in that direction, he calls ahead to let his neighbors know in order to give them time to secure their dog.
“I have a thing where you squeeze a handle and this thing comes out on the end and it closes a little latch so it is good for picking up trash,” Walt Johansson said. “I pick up trash every time I walk, therefore it has two purposes. It picks up trash and it defends me. If a dog is coming at me I can take this thing and whack him on the head.”
Almost 90 years old now, Walt Johansson is still in good health. He lives alone and still does his own mowing and property maintenance. He designed the brick alcove into which his wood stove is nestled. It produces more than enough heat for the house and allows him to cook his own meals when the power goes out.
He speaks with Eric Johansson almost daily and he remains active in the New Harbor Methodist Church.
“I don’t have anybody checking on me but I have phone calls that I make and also I belong to a church,” he said.
“I am grateful for life, what life has given me so far; there have been some bumps I wasn’t guilty of, maybe some of them I am but nevertheless the world is full of opportunities,” Walt Johansson said. “I think being in this country is a real plus. When you look at other countries what they have and what they don’t have, oh boy, we are really lucky.”
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