Jeh Johnson, NOMA Founder

Professor and architect Jeh Vincent Johnson passed away on January 27th, 2021 at Vassar Brothers Hospital at the age of 89. In 1971, Mr. Johnson co-founded the National Organization of Minority Architects, along with eleven other fellow members at an AIA conference in Detroit. Johnson received his A.B. degree from Columbia University in New York in 1953 before being drafted to serve in the Counter Intelligence Corps of the U.S. Army until 1954. He then earned his M.A. degree in architecture in 1958 from Columbia University. He also served as chair of the National Committee on Housing for the American Institute of Architects (AIA). In 1977, he was elected to the AIA’s College of Fellows.

In 1956, Johnson was hired by renowned architect to the stars, Paul R. Williams, as a young designer. After graduate school, he received the William Kinne Fellows Fellowship and traveled throughout Europe studying architecture. He later joined the architectural firm of Adams and Woodbridge Architects in 1958. In 1962, Johnson co-founded Gindele and Johnson, along with William Gindele, where the focus of their work was on single and multi-family housing, community centers, churches, and schools. Two years later, Johnson accepted a faculty position in architecture and design at Vassar College in Poughkeepsie, New York. In 1967, he was appointed by President Lyndon B. Johnson to serve on the National Commission on Urban Problems. More on Mr. Johnson’s vast contributions to the profession and NOMA can be found here. In the coming days and weeks ahead more details will be shared by NOMA leadership on plans to honor both Mr. Johnson and the other eleven founders of NOMA with a new Founders Scholarship.