Elizabeth Ortenberg

In 1986, Liz Claiborne Inc. became the first company founded by a woman to be ranked among the Fortune 500. And of the companies on that list, hers was one of only a handful with women as chief executives. Anne Elisabeth Jane Claiborne was born March 31, 1929, in Brussels, the daughter of Omer Villere, a banker, and Louise Carol Fenner Claiborne. As a teenager, Ms. Claiborne spent summers with family in Baltimore or New Orleans. She was a direct descendant of William C. C. Claiborne, the first governor of Louisiana. Ms. Claiborne went on to work for a few other dress companies and later the Rhea Manufacturing Company, where she met her second husband, Arthur Ortenberg, in 1954. Although they were both married at the time — she to Ben Schultz, a photography agent — they began an affair and left the company because of it, Mr. Ortenberg said. “The two of us were accidents waiting to happen,” Mr. Ortenberg said. “I won her by reading aloud ‘The Little Prince.’ ” They divorced their spouses and were married in 1957. Mr. Schultz died many years ago. In addition to Mr. Ortenberg, she is survived by a son from her first marriage, Alexander G. Schultz, a jazz guitarist who lives in Germany; a brother, Omer Claiborne, a retired art dealer, of Santa Fe, N.M.; and by Mr. Ortenberg’s children from his previous marriage, Neil Ortenberg of New York and Nancy Ortenberg of Oak Park, Ill.