John Taylor Johnston (1820-1893)
Railroad President & 1st President of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York
He was President of the Central Railroad of New Jersey and a co-founder and first President of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, incorporated in 1870. In the following year, he and William T. Blodgett financed the initial "1871 Purchase" of 174-paintings for the museum. His sister, Margaret, was the first wife of John Bard and lived at Blithewood on the Hudson River. In 1850, he married "Fanny" daughter of James Colles, of New York, who he first met at the Louvre in Paris. Having lived with his parents for several years on Washington Square, in 1855 he built "the white marble house" at 8 Fifth Avenue on the corner of 8th Street (see images). He left $1.5-million between his four (of five) surviving children who included Emily, the wife of Robert Weeks de Forest, another President of the Metropolitan Museum of Art
