Bought the car new and has only abt 25,000 mi on it.  Babied and
garaged.  In excellent condition.  About 3 weeks ago the A/C stopped
working.  We thought hey, after this many years, probably needs
’recharging’ or maybe a new compressor.

Wrong.

We took it to our local authorized Ford dealership and got a repair
estimate:  $2,250 !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!  

Yep.  You read it correctly.  Turns out that "your evaporator is
blown - an extremely rare problem; almost never happens".

Natch, I was livid.   They explained they have to tear apart the
entire dashboard assy to replace the evap., hence the large $1,800
labor cost.  I gues the rest is the cost of the evap unit, coffee
breaks and what not.

I’ve written a letter to Ford complaining about this since because it
is such a rare failure, maybe they should help out on the repairs.  
That was sent just after I got the estimate.  So far, no response.

Anyone have any ideas what else I can do about his, except just get
rid of the car, and lick my wounds?  I’ve already been through the
problem with the replacement cylinder head due to warpage and, oh
yeah, the lousey front brakes that throw off tons of black dust making
the otherwise attractive car look like a beater (I’ve joined the class
action suit on that issue).

-greg-