Patricia Shontz (1933–1998, also known as Patricia J. Shontz, Patricia O. Shontz, Patricia Shontz Longe, and Patricia Longe) was an American economist, columnist, businesswoman, and academic.
By 1973 she had left her newspaper column and was a director of the Manufacturers National Bank of Detroit and of Manufacturers National Corporation.[5] She became a professor of business administration at the University of Michigan, and was awarded tenure there in 1976.[6] She was chair of the university's Senate Advisory Committee on Financial Affairs in 1978, when anti-apartheid protestors who wished the university to divest from South Africa accused her of having a conflict of interest because of her bank ties.[7] In 1978 she was elected as the first female director of the American Motors Corporation,[8] and by 1983 she was an outside director of six corporations.[9]
As well as her work at the University of Michigan, Shontz did consulting work as a principal for The Longe Company.[3] By 1997 she had retired from her faculty position. She continued to serve on corporate boards of directors, including one at Comerica, one of only 18 directorial seats held by women in Michigan-based Fortune 500 companies.[10] She retired from the Comerica board in March 1998,[11] and died in Naples, Florida on August 16, 1998.[11][3]