From citizen greeter to tour guide, Jerry Johnson is a cheerleader of Burlington's Jefferson Street
You can't say Jerry Johnson is Mr. Downtown — that moniker belonged to Bob Brueck.
You can't call him Mr. Burlington — that was Tom Walz.
You don't want to call him Mr. Jefferson because we already had a president with that name.
Whatever you call Jerry Johnson, he's one of Burlington's most visible and approachable downtown people on Jefferson Street.
If you've been at Burlington Vintage and Co. recently, or the Red Screen Door, Capitol Theater or a Downtown Partners Inc. meeting, you likely ran into Johnson.
If you're from out of town, all you really have to do is walk down Jefferson Street and Johnson will find you.
In his role of citizen greeter, Johnson provides strangers a bright window upon downtown Burlington, through which they can grab a glimpse of the town's vibrant aura.
"Downtown is a huge passion of mine, so I try to get involved in as many things as people will let me be involved in downtown," Johnson said. "I've got quite a full plate right now. I just do whatever needs to be done for the show."
Johnson has a long history in show business, and since moving to Burlington in 2012, he's been an enthusiastic volunteer with the Capitol Theater.
"Jerry is passionate about the Capitol Theater and has volunteered numerous hours to make sure the show goes on," Capitol director Tammy McCoy said.
Johnson, who grew up in the Burlington area, was drawn to the big city as a youth.
"That's where I wanted to go, like most people did when they go to college," he said. "I wouldn't change that for the world. It made me who I am, let me meet some of the best people I've ever met."
But as people get older, their priorities change.
"I knew I wanted to be around my family more, and I was just lucky that I could come back to a place where I fit in," Johnson said. "Most importantly to me, I knew in my way I could contribute to it to make it better."
He was voted Boy with the Best Personality in high school.
"Usually that means 'he has a good personality.' At the time, I thought it was a little bit of a let-down, but actually I relish it now," he said.
Johnson knew that, with his experiences working in Indianapolis, Chicago and Columbus, Ohio, he could bring some of that big city light to his hometown.
"I knew I could add to the great momentum that was already going on years before I ever came back here," he said.
Like Johnson, DPI Executive Director Amy Moyner returned to Burlington after cutting her teeth elsewhere.
"Jerry is my resource for anything downtown," Moyner said. "He's my No. 1 volunteer. He knows everybody. He's just tapped in with everything that's going on. He's a wealth of knowledge and support for the downtown. He has so much pride in our downtown and our community."
Moyner is right: In addition to his retail jobs, Johnson has contributed his time to the Downtown Partners board, chaired it last year and is chair of the design committee this year.
"That has to do with anything of beautification downtown," Johnson said. "The flower plantings, artwork, things like that. But one of the big things this year is because we have the TIGER grant roaring its way down Jefferson Street."
More: What to expect over the coming months in downtown Burlington as TIGER work progresses
Johnson was referring to the city's Transportation Infrastructure Generating Economic Recovery grant project involving the Burlington riverfront and a revamp of Jefferson Street's roads and aesthetics.
Johnson's committee is responsible for TIGER-related signage and traffic flow and such, letting people know the stores are open in the blocks under construction, and how to get there.
"That's going to be a big focus of ours as well," he said.
Jerry Johnson fills many roles from cheerleader to house hunter
Ask Johnson's downtown associates to describe the man and they will all say, "cheerleader."
"Jerry's a cheerleader for the community," Moyner said. "He has so many stories about talking to visitors, welcoming everyone who enters, whether they've lived here forever or first-time."
Johnson, who grew up in the Burlington area, refers to the DPI board members as "cheerleaders for downtown." While he wasn't a cheerleader in high school, he believes the best way to be able to sell something is to love it.
"It's really easy because I love Burlington, and I love to talk about it," he said. "You know me, I don't have any problem talking. And so I do: I love the architecture, I love the stores, I love the people, I love the history — everything. It's not a job, it's fun. I'm enthusiastic about it because I love doing it."
"I always say his brain goes much faster than the rest of him," Red Screen Door owner Doreen Roy said. "He's always thinking about things; you look at him sometimes and he's motionless. But you can tell his brain is moving."
Moyner said Johnson has helped find houses for people from out-of-state who subsequently decide to move to Burlington, in part because of his help and guidance and his enthusiasm for the community.
Last summer, Johnson met a couple from Reno, Nevada, who said they were thinking of moving to the Midwest.
"They had no idea where, they picked a couple of places just to visit. Somehow Burlington was one of them, and I latched onto them," Johnson said. "It was my goal to get them to move here."
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So he sent them video of houses they were interested in and a few downtown events and told them, "If you lived here, this is what you could be doing."
That couple is moving to Burlington this summer.
"You know they would have done that whether I had been here or not, but I was able to, to massage the situation a little bit," Johnson said.
Jerry Johnson adds to Jefferson Street's aesthetic with window displays
Johnson works daytime hours at the Jefferson Street businesses Red Screen Door and Burlington Vintage and Co.
"I love working with the public. I love retail. I know you don't hear that very often, but I do love retail, and I love being in a mom-and-pop shop, in this case both mom shops," he said.
Johnson said Doreen Roy, owner of Red Screen Door and Gypsi, and Vintage and Co. Burlington owner Chelsea Stevens are "wonderful women and businesspeople."
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"They kind of give me a free hand to do just about whatever I want," he said. "So I work with the customers, but I also do engage in my passion, which is visual merchandising and making things pretty."
"He's a great person to have downtown because he has kind of a total vision of what we can be," Roy said. "It's not just about our business — it's about the whole of downtown Burlington, Iowa, as a district."
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Back to Johnson's passion here: decorating store windows. Johnson has an interior decorator's keen eye for color, balance and depth, and his window displays at the women's shops offer a bit of eye candy for any casual Jefferson Street stroller.
"I like creating stories with merchandise, and pretty little vignettes, and things that make people go 'ah' or 'ooh” or whatever words they want to make … and then buy something," Johnson said with a laugh.
"Jerry is a wealth of knowledge for anything downtown," Moyner said. "He's been in and out of so many of the businesses and helped them with their windows."
Roy said Johnson provides her business with skilled display work.
"He does an unsurpassed job of putting things together and making them look amazing," Roy said. "He has a little bit of a different eye. And it's not just display work that he does well; he has some really good ideas about other things, too."
Shall we call him Mr. Windows? Or does that make him sound too much like Bill Gates?
Burlington's enthusiastic tour guide
To call Johnson a people person is an understatement: Johnson is unafraid of strangers and will buttonhole out-of-towners to offer directions or, for the lucky ones, a tour.
"One thing I really like to do is give downtown tours and walking tours of Jefferson Street, and I learn from them," Johnson said. "I got most of my information and the stories I tell from Steve Frevert when he was the director of Downtown Partners, and so I've stolen a lot of his material. I've come up with other stories on my own — I haven't had to make any up."
Chris Gram, director of the Convention and Visitors Bureau, said it is not uncommon for Johnson to show up to events wearing a brightly colored volunteer shirt, ready to help out wherever he may be needed.
Johnson said he meets a lot of Burlington visitors downtown.
More: West Burlington couple buys a half-block of buildings on Jefferson Street. A look at their plans.
"I love to just walk down Jefferson Street — and I know this is going to sound a little creepy — but sometimes I'll just sort of listen to people's conversations to try and figure out whether they're a tourist or a traveler or a visitor, and sometimes I'll just plain out ask them ... you know, if they're pointing at things or if I hear them say, ‘I wonder…' or 'where shall we eat?’ I'll jump in and start talking to them. Literally, sometimes I wander downtown and stalk people. I really do," he said with a laugh.
The result can be anything from a two-minute conversation to a two-hour conversation.
Johnson said there's no official "tour guide" status to his efforts.
"There's not a set tour at set times," he said. "We do have people who stop in, just come into the Theater randomly and want to see the place, and if I have time, then I'll offer them an actual walking tour as well."
Johnson's style is to introduce to sightseers "so they don't think I'm just a nut on the street," he said. "They figure that out later."
Again, that big laugh.
Johnson will invite visitors to whatever is going on at the moment, be it Farmers Market or Very Vintage Market or any music event going on at the time.
"I point those out to try to get them back another time, if we can," he said. "I always find out where they're from and what drew them here in the first place. Usually, it's someone who lives here that they came to visit."
Call him the Daystalker?
Nah. Call him Jerry Johnson.
How to get a Jerry Johnson tour
It's easy to locate Jerry Johnson to set up a tour: Just go to the Red Screen Door at 312 Jefferson St., Burlington Vintage at 515 Jefferson St., the Capitol Theater at 211 N. Third St., or call Moyner at (319) 752-6365 or ask anyone on the street.
He's easy to find.
This article originally appeared on The Hawk Eye: Have a question about downtown Burlington Iowa? Ask Jerry Johnson.
