Houghton was born in Corning, New York, on December 12, 1906.[2] He was the son of Mahitbel "Mabel" (née Hollister) Houghton (1867–1938) and Arthur Amory Houghton Sr. (1866–1928), a former president of Corning Glass.[3] His parents lived in Corning and in New York City at 920 and 941 Park Avenue. He had two older sisters, Phoebe Hollister Houghton, who died young, and Gratia Buell Houghton, who married writer and playwright Alan Rinehart.[4]
After his graduation from Harvard, Houghton joined the family business. In 1933, he began his forty-year service as president of Steuben Glass Works, a subsidiary of the Corning Company, where he is credited for a change of artistic direction toward more modern forms, which incorporated Art Deco and modernist themes. He hired renowned sculptors including Sidney Waugh, Massimo Vignelli.[1]
In 1960, Mr. Houghton gifted 273 acres of land on Spencer Hill in Corning, New York for the development of Corning Community College. Warner, Burns, Toan & Lunde Architects of New York City were selected as campus architects. When the College’s permanent library was completed on the Spencer Hill campus in May 1964, it was appropriately dedicated to Arthur A. Houghton, Jr.[1]
In September 1964, Houghton was elected to replace Roland L. Redmond as the 10th president of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City,[9] and became chairman in 1969 (and serving until 1972). Houghton, who was a member of more than 100 education and arts organizations, served on the board of the Museum from 1952 to 1974. He was succeeded as president by C. Douglas Dillon, a former investment banker who had worked with the Eisenhower, Kennedy and Johnson Administrations.[1]
Personal life
On June 12, 1929, Houghton married Jane Olmsted (1909–1982) at St. Stephen's Episcopal Church in Harrisburg.[10] Jane was the daughter of Gertrude (née Howard) McCormick and Marlin Edgar Olmsted, a Republican member of the U.S. Congress from Pennsylvania.[11][12] Before their divorce in July 1938, they were the parents of:
Jane Olmsted Houghton (1930–1989), who married Rollin Van Nostrand Hadley Jr. in 1950.[13][14] She later married Robert Gordon Hankey,[15] Horace E. Henderson, and George R. Kneeland.
Sylvia Houghton (b. 1933), who married Richard Gordon Garrett in 1963.[16]
His first wife remarried to Hugh McMillan in 1947.[17] On June 7, 1939, he was married for the second time to Ellen Crenshaw (1906–1961) in Queenstown, Maryland. Ellen was a friend of Washington journalist Joseph Alsop.[18] Before their divorce in January 1944, they were the parents of one child:[19]
Arthur Amory Houghton III (b. 1940), who married Sherrill Jean Mulliken in 1968.[20] He later married Linda Livingston Davis, daughter of Goodhue Livingston Jr., in 1987. Arthur was the assistant curator in antiquities at the J. Paul Getty Museum.[21]
On January 15, 1944, he married for the third time to Elizabeth Douglas McCall (1919–1996), a daughter of Arthur May McCall.[22] They lived at 3 Sutton Place, a four-story brick townhouse that was built in 1921 for Anne Morgan, daughter of financier J.P. Morgan. In 1971, Mr. Houghton Jr donated it to the United Nations for use as the official residence of the Secretary-General in 1972[23]) and before their divorce in 1972, were the parents of one child:
Hollister Douglas "Holly" Houghton (b. 1945), who married equestrian William D. Haggard III in 1968.[24]
After their divorce, Elizabeth remarried to prominent architect Walker O. Cain in 1973.[25] On May 22, 1973, he married for the fourth, and final time, to Nina (née Rodale) Horstmann (b. 1937) at Annapolis. Nina, the daughter of J. I. Rodale of Rodale, Inc. and sister of Robert Rodale, was previously married to Robert Horstmann.[26] In 1979, the philanthropic couple donated the Wye Plantation, their previous compound, to the Aspen Institute.