Johnson's health had always been uncertain, and by the time he retired from office, he was not a well man. He spent his remaining years at his beloved ranch in Texas, tending to his investments, preparing his memoirs, and overseeing development of his presidential library. The memoirs, called The Vantage Point: Perspectives of the Presidency, 1963-1969, were completed in 1971.

The University of Texas in Austin is home to the LBJ Presidential Library, which opened in mid-1971, as well as the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs, one of the premier public policy schools in the nation. Lyndon Johnson died of a heart attack on January 22, 1973, just one day before the Paris Peace Accords ending the Vietnam War were concluded. His grave lies in the Johnson family cemetery under a stand of live oak trees along the Pedernales River at the LBJ Ranch.