NATION

With the May Department Stores’ purchase of Associated Dry Goods now complete, Associated Chairman and Chief Executive Joseph H. Johnson has announced his retirement plans.

Johnson, 64, will retire effective Oct. 31, but he intends to remain on May’s board for at least two years. He said he plans to split his retirement time between Greenwich, Conn., and Florida.

Johnson was named Associated Dry Goods Corp.’s chief financial officer in 1979, vice chairman in 1981, and chairman and chief executive in 1984.

On the May Department Stores board, along with Johnson, will be five other former Associated Dry Goods executives, including Joseph E. Brooks, chairman of the Lord & Taylor division, a specialty fashion house. Farrell has said May intends to expand the 38-store Lord & Taylor franchise in an “orderly manner.”