Alma was born to Robert Johnson & Elizabeth Johnston on December 2nd 1858, 9 years after the settlement of Manti, in a small one room adobe house in the center of town. He was the eighth in a family of 14, 8 of which died in infancy. Before many years the Robert Johnson family purchased a rock house (still standing), one block east of main, on 3rd north from Luther Tuttle. Alma's father, Robert, extensively added to the house and it was dubbed "the big house"

The Manti of Alma's youth was a frontier town, beset with Indian problems and Grasshopper infestations. In 1865 the Black Hawk band of Indians killed 32 white settlers in Sanpete & Sevier counties. In 1866 LDS church leaders consolidated the settlements into forts at Manti, Ephraim, Mt. Pleasant, Moroni & Gunnison. Black Hawk War peace treaty was signed in 1869. The first large grasshopper plague arrived in the spring of 1869. Over the years the grasshoppers were a continuing problem to the Sanpete farmers. They deep plowed to bury the eggs deep in the ground, raked the eggs into the sunlight to kill them, or drove the insects into rows of straw or large pits to burn them. The County paid a bounty of one dollar per bushel for grasshoppers. All efforts gave minimal effects.

As a youngster and indeed all his life Alma was very bashful. Alma's mother told of a trip made to an adjoining town to visit friends. They took Alma who was quite young. Though they stayed overnight, they could not persuade him to get out of the wagon, and had to carry food out to him. Alma went to school only in the winter time and he recorded names as John P. Squires, John Bench, Alvira Coolidge (Cox), A. Billings and William T. Reid as teachers. School was first in private homes, usually of the teacher, where they sat on hard homemade benches without backs and no desks in front and had to be moved out in some places while the family had meals. Later on they held school in the upper room of the Court House, in the Council House and then in a little north ward school house which stood on the Court House block.

As a youth (12 yrs old) in order to obtain cash money, Alma hauled logs on a hill north of Manti with a team of oxen. Oxen are not like horses. They wear no bridle, only a yoke and are guided by command (hee & haw) and a heavy stick. Alma told his daughter, Alice, that he had a very fine team and he enjoyed working with them. However when Alma's sister Elisabeth and her husband, Francis M. Cox, received a call to go into Arizona to live and colonize under the United Order, Alma's father Robert felt that they should help them out by letting them have one of the oxen. The ox Alma got to replace it was so wild and unruly that it had to be left in yoke overnight to catch it in the morning.

In addition Alma went to the Nevada mining camps as a freighter, hauling & selling his father's flour and grain to obtain much needed cash for the family. Still very young (14 or 15) people marveled that he should undertake such a hazardous occupation. He was not worried, sometimes he had an older brother along and he was lucky enough to escape being held up and robbed. By this time he was using horses for teams. He worked for Warren Snow and Bishop Moffitt grading the railroad in Sevier canyon with team and scraper for $3.50/day this was around 1878. In Castle Valley, Emery County, on the Buckhorn Flat, he graded the railroad with James Hoggan, Charles Patten and earnest Munk, receiving better pay than in Sevier canyon. Alma used his Brother Robert Johnson's mule team and left his horse team with Robert at Orangeville, Emery County. Later, about 1890 Alma worked in Park City with Joseph Henrie & William Lowry hauling and chopping mining timbers from Cottonwood canyon. A load a day made about 7 to 8 dollars a day, which was enough to save and bank some money. He also hauled some Rubet rock to Salt Lake City; this was hard on team and wagon & the pay small.

A farmer at heart, Alma acquired some land and worked with his father Robert at farming. Later he acquired some livestock for ranching and took up bee-keeping as a side line. At first Alma had only a few acres and worked with his father and brothers. It wasn't too long before his younger brother Nephi wished to sell-out and go to Idaho so Alma bought him out. Then when his father Robert decided to retire from active life, he bought his land, and also bought -out the inheritance land from the sisters, until he had acquired all of the land which had belonged in the Johnson family, Alma was considered one of the more successful farmers in the Manti area. The farm provided an inheritance base for his two sons and an income base to help the family in college or for missions. The farm, just north of the Manti temple and East of highway 89, still remains in the Johnson family. Alma's older son Robert, purchased the younger son, Evan's share and the acreage then went down to Robert's son Glen and on to Glen's sons. Thus the acreage has been owned by 5 generations of the Johnson family.

As a young man Alma became a member of Brother A. C. Smythe's choir and sang at the dedication of the Manti, and the Salt Lake Temples. Alma was blessed with a fine tenor voice and loved to use it in praise to our Heavenly Father. His daughter Alice fondly remembers him singing the hymns and choir songs as he busied himself in the early morning, building fires and helping the children getting dressed. He was a choir member for about 60 years under several different leaders. When Alma desired to bear his testimony, he did it by singing, because singing was easier for him than speaking.
Alma played a cornet in the 20 piece brass band that rendered music for the town on holidays and other occasions. He and Jody and Jens Hansen, William Lowry and the Westenskows' furnished the music for the dances. James Crawford and Hans Larson called for the quadrilles.
In 1886, Alma chose Margaret Estella Henrie to marry. They went by team to Moroni, stayed overnight with his mother's married sister, Myra Olson and then went on to Logan by train the next day. They were endowed and married in the Logan temple November 25th 1886 Thanksgiving day.
After marriage, Alma & Margaret lived in one room of the family home for 2 years. Then Alma bought the lot farther east on the same street and moved his wife into a small adobe house, where they lived the balance of their lives. This house has been enlarged and remodeled over the years. 10 children were born to them there, 7 of whom they raised to maturity. The family joked about a farmer having 7 girls out of the ten children. Their children in birth order were: Alice, Elizabeth, Kate, Alma Henrie, Estella, Vera, Margaret, Ruth, Robert and Evan.

After the first 3 daughters were born, Alma received a call in 1894 to a mission in England. He obediently turned the farm over to a young nephew and went as requested
After his mission Alma settled down to family life and farming again. Alma continued his life as a farmer until he was 80 years old, though he had turned the management over to the two boys. He was active in all aspects of his religion throughout all his life, supporting others on missions, paying his tithes and totally committed to the faith that his mother embraced in England against the will of her parents. He died the 1 November 1956 just one month and one day before his 98th birthday and three weeks before his 70th wedding day.