Elizabeth Rohatyn

Elizabeth F. Rohatyn, a major supporter of numerous arts and educational organizations, including the New York Public Library, died on Sunday at her home in Manhattan. She was 86. Her death was confirmed by Heather Kelly, her nurse. Ms. Rohatyn, the wife of the financier Felix G. Rohatyn, was a former chairwoman of the library, a board member of Lincoln Center, a former president of the Lenox Hill Neighborhood Association and the founder of Teaching Matters Inc., a nonprofit to help teachers use technology in the classroom. She also worked with New Visions for Public Schools and WNET/Channel 13. She and Mr. Rohatyn sponsored an I Have a Dream Foundation project, which followed more than 50 low-income children through six years of middle and high school, graduation and four years of college. (The foundation reports that almost 90 percent of its more than 2,500 participants in the New York area have graduated from high school, and 87 percent have gone on to higher education.) When Mr. Rohatyn was ambassador to France, from 1997 to 2000, Ms. Rohatyn created Frame, the French Regional & American Museum Exchange, a consortium of museums in American cities like Dallas, Minneapolis and Cleveland and French cities like Lille, Montpellier and Lyon. She was named a member of the Legion d’Honneur in 2002 and an officer in 2007. Elizabeth Fly was born on May 11, 1930, in Memphis, the daughter of D. Wilson Fly, a stockbroker, and the former Louise Campbell. She graduated from the Foxcroft School in Virginia and attended both Sarah Lawrence College and the College of Santa Fe. Her first two marriages, to Charles C. Renshaw Jr., an editor and publishing executive, and to Alexander Vagliano, ended in divorce. She married Mr. Rohatyn in 1979. As chairman of the Municipal Assistance Corporation, created by New York State, he engineered the rescue of New York City from insolvency in the 1970s. Besides her husband, her survivors include a daughter from her first marriage, Nina Griscom; three stepsons, Nicolas, Pierre and Michael; and several grandchildren.