A Ford & an Austin

When an apparently splendid marriage goes on the rocks, it sets people to wondering just what brought about the tragedy. All last week, people who knew Anne and Henry Ford--and many of those who didn't--were pondering the chain of events that led the U.S.'s most prominent industrial boss to legal separation--and to what seemed likely to be a European rendezvous with a hand some Italian divorcee named Christina Austin.

The romance between Henry Ford II and Anne McDonnell had been like something out of a woman's magazine. Only more so -- since there was so much money around. They met on an ocean liner coming back from Europe in the summer of 1936: a chunky, jolly young man just entering Yale, and a finely drawn blonde beauty from Southampton whose grandfather was Utility Tycoon Thomas E. Murray and whose father maintained a fancy Manhattan apartment.

Corinthian Pillars. The McDonnells were Roman Catholic; as Methodist-born Henry came courting, he decided to adopt their faith. No less a personage than Msgr. (now Bishop) Fulton J. Sheen gave him instructions, and married them in Southampton on July 13, 1940.

Henry and Anne settled into their roles as well-gilded Corinthian pillars of U.S. society, but as time went on, the tension between Henry's extrovert, huggy-bear conviviality and Anne's cool, tight-lipped dignity became more and more obtrusive.

Then began the rumors about a "contessa," said to have a chic New York apartment; Ford reportedly flew in to see her now and then. On one occasion, the story went, the two appeared at a top Manhattan restaurant only to be told by the headwaiter that no tables were available. When Henry insisted on being seated, the maitre d'hotel was forced to whisper that Daughter Charlotte was dining inside.

High Taste. No details of the separation agreement were released, but it is rumored that Henry gave Anne their big summer home in Southampton, plus a huge cash settlement.

There was no suggestion of divorce. But at last the papers could break out pictures of the contessa, who turned out to be no contessa at all, but Maria Christina Vettore Austin. Born in Venice 36 years ago of well-to-do parents, she cultivated a taste for international high life, and married and divorced a British naval officer named William Austin, now dead. Christina and Henry Ford met in Paris at a party given by Grace Kelly Rainier in 1960.

Slender, blue-eyed Maria turned up at the office of a Milan newspaperman friend one day last week to see how they were playing the story. He jokingly wrote out a fake headline quoting her as saying: I LOVE HENRY AND I WILL SOON MARRY HIM. "Oh no!" she squealed, laughing delightedly. "That would ruin me!" They agreed to make it: MARIA CHRISTINA DOES NOT DENY FRIENDSHIP WITH HENRY FORD.

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