About the Author
Reverend F. Miriam Harris Johnson , the daughter of Moses and Fannie Harris of Birmingham, Alabama, is the youngest of ten children. She is the product of the public and private schools of Birmingham where she blossomed into honorary status. As a member of the graduating class of Ullman High School in Birmingham, Alabama, Miriam was one of the principal commencement speakers, having written her class song. She attended and graduated from Johnson C. Smith University, Charlotte, North Carolina. She received a bachelor of arts from Johnson C. Smith University, Charlotte, North Carolina, a master of arts from University of California at Los Angeles, attending theological seminaries at Johnson C. Smith University and Fuller Theological Seminary. While a college student in North Carolina, at the inception of the Civil Rights Movement, Miriam took an active role in nonviolent assembly in Charlotte, Atlanta, and Birmingham. Miriam led her twelfth-grade classes of Spanish to integrate lunch counters in Alabama.
As the founder and director of Miriam & Co. Performing Arts, Miriam has structured the organization as an outreach for academic achievements, assisting the homeless and needy in food and housing and providing a net to meet the needs of the less fortunate. Five scholarships have been awarded to students in the Moreno Valley School districts. They were awarded during the years of 1991, 1992, 1993, 1995, and 2002. Students receiving these awards possessed extremely creative abilities in the performing arts. Many of them are currently working in several venues of the arts. Miriam has also worked as a volunteer in Moreno Valley’s literacy program, which was then supported by the Riverside County Public Library. She and her husband, Ed, visit the parks in the city frequently and feed those who are homeless.
In 1976, Miriam served as the first community developer for the United Methodist Church’s Race & Religion project in Pacoima, California. She implemented social change by giving individuals a voice and choice by becoming economically stable and by developing occupational skills.
While a resident in Simi Valley, California, Miriam participated in the Fair Housing Project, taught high school English, wrote skits and rehearsed kids in her daughter’s elementary school class, served as co-counselor with her husband, Ed, for the Methodist Youth Fellowship, was a member of the Ventura County NAACP, and accepted the offer to write a play, which she entitled The Family Reunion. Miriam was the first to establish a Christian Supper Club, wherein she organized and presented a Gospel Fest in a nightclub in Simi Valley—the first ever to be done in either San Fernando or Simi Valley.
Miriam is a lifetime member of the National Council of Negro Women, a lifetime member of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, a member of the National League of American Pen Women. While inactive, she still holds membership in the Congress of Racial Equality, the Democratic Club, Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Ministerial ALLIANCES, Speakers Bureau of Los Angeles County, and a current member of the Moreno Valley United Methodist Church. Miriam is also founder and director of Miriam & Co. Performing Arts Ministry, which she founded in December 1981 and presented her first original play, The Family Reunion. She is also author of a poetry booklet, which she shared with her father.
She is the author of An Easterlude, which highlights the Seven Last Words of Christ and a musical drama entitled Reflections. Her latest writing, You Are Mine, a book which is a travelogue in a Christian experience, documents her “walk” with the Lord through three cancer bouts and her daily journaling of inspired messages from God.
Miriam was nominated and included in Who’s Who in Entertainment 1992–1993 and Who’s Who of American Women 1995–1996.
Miriam confesses, however, that her greatest attainment is that of her “marriage” to the Lord. She was ordained a minister in 1989. She is married to Edward Johnson, and they are the parents of two lovely daughters, Angela and Danielle. Her favorite quote comes from Shakespeare, “All the world is a stage and each one must play a part,” coupled with the philosophy that “a winner never quits and a quitter never wins.”