Obituary of Kent D. Johnson

Kent D. Johnson, 59, devoted husband of Lisa Rinaolo-Johnson, and loving father to five children, passed away in the early hours of Tuesday, April 20, 2021 at Albany Medical Center.  

Born July 31, 1961 in Corning, New York, he was the second son of Delmar and Jean (Fesser) Johnson.  Kent grew up in Horseheads, NY, and graduated from high school in 1979.  Kent went on to attend SUNY Buffalo, with aspirations of earning an engineering degree.  This was aborted quickly, soon after he realized that calculus and physics were both mandatory requirements for getting said degree.  Instead, Kent steered his focus on Geology, the subject in which he would receive his Bachelor’s degree (1983).  In 1987, Kent began his lifelong career at the NYS Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC), working as a hydrogeologist in Albany, NY.  Soon thereafter, he got bored of working and wandered around the office where he met his eventual first wife.  The pair had two children, Bradley and Grace, before mutually separating in 2006.  After a few years Kent began pursuing love a second time.  Although a strong candidate to be an online dating stud, Kent instead used safer means of finding dates: meeting single moms of Grace’s girl scout troop.  It was through his daughter’s best friend Katheryn (Katie) that he met Lisa (Shallo) Rinaolo, the eventual love of his life.  After a couple of years of awkward flower exchanges and watching a slew of uneventful hockey games together, the two got engaged in Jackson Garden at Union College.  The pair married in December of 2014, officially uniting Lisa and her three children (Sarah, Julia, and Katie) to his family.

Kent had a number of hobbies and interests, but his biggest love was his family.  All five children (and his dogs) viewed him as their father, and he never disappointed to put them above all else (again, including his dogs).  If you were to summarize Kent in one word, the word would be “selfless”- he never once put himself ahead of making someone else’s day.  His favorite thing to do every year while working for DEC was hosting children at Five Rivers Environmental Education Center in Delmar, NY, and watching their faces light up when the asteroid exhibit wiped out the dinosaurs.  Seeing other people happy made him happy.

In the instances where he did have time for himself, Kent enjoyed hiking, golf, tennis, and curling at the Schenectady Curling Club in his later years.  On the golf front: we’d be remiss to neglect two notable accomplishments: that he aced the 17th hole of Orchard Creek golf course in 2019, and he also (more importantly) birdied the 18th hole of Saratoga National golf course.  

Kent also was a big fan of watching historically-underwhelming professional sports teams on TV: the Buffalo Bills and Sabres for football and hockey respectively, as well as the New York Mets for baseball.  

Kent is survived by his loving wife, Lisa Rinaolo-Johnson of Glenville; and children: Bradley (Johnson) of Niskayuna, Sarah (Rinaolo) of Niskayuna, Julia (Rinaolo) of Glenville, Katie (Rinaolo) of Glenville, and Grace (Johnson) of Niskayuna.  Kent was also a loving and accepting father figure to each of the children’s significant others, most notably the affianced Taylor Harvey (to Bradley) and Michael Gabriele (to Julia), both of Niskayuna.

Visitation hours will occur at the Glenville Funeral Home, 9 Glenridge Rd, Scotia, on Saturday, April 24 from 12:00-3:00 PM.  A service will follow at 3:00pm at the funeral home. In lieu of flowers, memorial donations in Kent’s name may be made to the Champions of Hope (https://champions-of-hope.funraise.org/) to help others fighting colon cancer. Online condolences www.glenvillefuneralhome.com