Sandra W. Meyer

Sandra Wasserstein Meyer, a resident of Lee Avenue, East Hampton, and Manhattan, who was one of the first female executives at several major corporations, died on Dec. 30, 1997, at New York University Hospital in Manhattan. Mrs. Meyer, who was 60, had breast cancer for several years.

Mrs. Meyer played a part in inspiring "The Sisters Rosensweig," a long-running Broadway drama written by her younger sister, Wendy Wasserstein, a Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright.

"My sister was the glue in the family," Ms. Wasserstein said this week. "Extraordinary, and really smart," her sister was a role model, she said, because she was "simultaneously very strong and very nurturing. She was a wonderful mother, and the best older sister."

Mrs. Meyer was proud to serve for several years as a member of Guild Hall's board, her sister said, and held the post at the time of her death. The last gala the two women attended together was in Manhattan on Dec. 2, 1997, when the playwright re ceived a Lifetime Achievement Award from the East Hampton cultural center.

"She loved East Hampton," said her sister, where, on New Year's Eve, Cantor Debra Stein Davidson of the Jewish Center of the Hamptons conducted a private service. A second service is planned for 4 p.m. on Jan. 19, at Manhattan's Lincoln Center.

The eldest of the four children of Lola and Morris Wasserstein, Mrs. Meyer was born in Brooklyn on Aug. 20, 1937. She graduated from Brooklyn's Madison High School when she was 15, and the next year went on to the University of Michigan. She earned a bachelor's degree cum laude from Syracuse University, and did graduate work in economics and philosophy at the London School of Economics.

Mrs. Meyer made history as a female marketing executive, her family said. In 1969, she became General Foods' first female product group manager, running marketing campaigns for some of its biggest brands, including Maxwell House coffee. In 1976 she was named head of worldwide marketing for the American Express card, and in 1980 she became the first female president of an American Express Company division - communications.

Mrs. Meyer joined Citicorp in 1989 as its first female senior officer to run corporate affairs, and was widely credited with restoring the company's reputation following a financial crisis in the early '90s.

Three years ago, she became a senior partner at Clark and Weinstock, management consultants, a job she held until her death. She also was a managing director of Russell Reynolds Associates, a corporate search firm, and a board member of B.C.A.M. International, a software firm. She also served on the boards of Munsingwear Incorporated, Anchor Hocking, and Horizons International Foods.

She was a managing director of the Metropolitan Opera Association, a trustee of the Metropolitan Opera Guild, and a founding member of the Committee of 200, a national group of senior female executives.

Mrs. Meyer's two marriages, to Richard Meyer and to Peter Schweitzer, with whom she had two daughters, ended in divorce.

Besides her parents and her sister Wendy, of Manhattan, Mrs. Meyer is survived by two daughters, Jenifer Schweitzer of Manhattan and Samantha Schweitzer of San Francisco. Another sister, Georgette Levis, lives in Manchester, Vt., and a brother, Bruce Wasserstein, lives in East Hampton and Manhattan.

The family has suggested memorial donations to the Sandra W. Meyer Foundation, care of Jenifer Schweitzer, 150 East 77th Street, New York, N.Y. 10021.