Anne Ford Johnson, 76, Dies; Influenced Fashion and Arts

Anne McDonnell Ford Johnson, who served on the White House Fine Arts Committee during the Eisenhower and Kennedy administrations, helped restore Blair House in Washington and played an active role in social and charitable events in New York, died Friday at New York Hospital-Cornell Medical Center. She was 76.

Her death was due to complications from a stroke, her daughter Charlotte Ford said.

Mrs. Johnson was divorced from the late Henry Ford 2d, the chairman of the Ford Motor Company, in 1964. She married Deane F. Johnson, a prominent Los Angeles lawyer, in 1968 and the couple moved to New York in 1980.

One of 14 children in the prominent New York family of James F. McDonnell, Mrs. Johnson was born in Rye, N.Y., and grew up in a duplex apartment in Manhattan and on the 55-acre family estate in Southampton. Her grandfather, Thomas E. Murray, was a utilities executive and inventor.

Mrs. Johnson attended the Convent of the Sacred Heart in Noroton, Conn., and the Grattanelli School in Sienna, Italy. She met Mr. Ford while returning from a European trip in 1936, and they were married in 1940 in what was a major event of the Southampton social season. The service was conducted by the Most Rev. Fulton J. Sheen, then a monsignor, who had instructed Mr. Ford in Roman Catholicism before his conversion.

During her years in Grosse Pointe, Mich., she was active in the support of the Detroit Institute of Art and the Metropolitan Opera Association of Detroit. She was also one of the first women elected to the board of the Metropolitan Museum of Art. In 1956, she was selected as one of the 10 best-dressed women in the world and four years later was named to the Fashion Hall of Fame.

The announcement of the Ford separation and divorce followed months of rumor in which Mr. Ford was linked romantically to the Italian-born Maria Cristina Vettore Austin, the divorced wife of a British naval officer. Mr. Ford and Mrs. Austin were married in 1965.

Shortly after her divorce, Mrs. Ford, who had moved to Manhattan, was with a friend having a cup of espresso at the Regency Hotel. She noticed Mrs. Austin, who was with a friend at another table. "This had to happen some time," she whispered to her companion. "I think the only gracious thing is to go over and say hello. You know I've never met her." The two went over, introduced themselves and shook hands. Mrs. Ford's friend later reported: "It was all very civilized, but if there were a way to bottle up the electricity in that little room, it would run the Ford industries for a solid year."

After her marriage to Mr. Johnson, to whom she was introduced by Rocky Converse, the widow of Gary Cooper, Mrs. Johnson created an instant status revolution in Los Angeles, where she immediately became the most prestigious hostess. The couple bought a Regency-style house that Mrs. Johnson, who was known as a connoisseur of French furniture, filled with the pieces she had collected. She eventually became the Los Angeles representative of Christie's, the international auction house. Later, in New York, she was associated for a time with Sotheby's.

Survivors include Mr. Johnson, two daughters, Charlotte Ford of Manhattan and Anne Ford of Southampton and Manhattan; a son, Edsel B. Ford 2d of Grosse Pointe; five sisters, Katherine Sullivan of Arizona, Mary Murnane and Margie Murphy of Florida, Barbara Hennessey of Connecticut and Sheila Collins of California; two brothers, Morgan McDonnell of Chicago and Jim McDonnell of Detroit, seven grandchildren and one great-grandchild.