Real estate developer helped build a world-class university in Stony Brook. Their fund at The Trust supports Long Island nonprofits.
Erwin P. Staller (1921-2019)
Pearl F. Staller (1923-2023)
Starting in the early 1950s, Erwin Staller and his father, Max, literally changed the landscape of Long Island, developing numerous neighborhood shopping centers, office buildings, and industrial spaces. But their most powerful legacy lives on at Stony Brook University, where the family contributed millions and the 1,000-seat performing arts center bears the Staller name.
In true rags-to-riches style, Max Staller immigrated to America in 1915 from Russia and found a job selling fruits and vegetables out of a Farmingdale warehouse.
Max married Mary Shor in 1917, and they lived in Hempstead, where Erwin, the eldest of their four children, was born in 1921. By the 1930s, Max had moved his family to a 21-room stone mansion in Westbury.
Erwin graduated from Hempstead High School, then studied at Allegheny College in Pennsylvania until World War II erupted. He enlisted in the Army and served in the Signal Corps in the Southwest Pacific.
After returning home, Erwin married his high school sweetheart, Pearl “Freddie” Friedman. While Erwin was occupied with college and the Army, Freddie graduated from Bennington College, attended M.I.T., and earned a master’s in economics from Columbia University.
To support his growing family, which soon included five children, Erwin joined his father’s wholesale produce company. According to family lore, the father-son team was working with the Great Atlantic & Pacific Tea Company, later known as A&P, to identify the best sites for new supermarkets when they decided to start their own real estate business.
In the early 1950s, Erwin and Max co-founded Staller Associates in Hempstead and began developing small shopping plazas, each anchored by a supermarket, a drugstore, and a post office. By July 1961, the Staller team had opened 18 shopping centers, according to Newsday.
Max Staller, who was nicknamed “Mr. Suffolk” because of his vast real estate holdings, died in April 1987. He was 96. Until the end, he was enthusiastic about “the game,” his longtime friend and fellow real estate developer Wilbur Breslin told Newsday. “Two months ago, he was in here trying to work a deal … He said, ‘Willy, this is a fantastic piece of property for the future.’ ”
The following year, the Staller family made the first seven-figure donation in Stony Brook University’s history. The school used that gift made in Max and Mary’s memory to support its new fine arts center and renamed it the Staller Center for the Arts.
The Stallers’ endowment “opened the door,” said Alan Inkles, the center’s longtime director. “Up until that time, we were not doing a lot of big shows … He [Erwin] understood what we were about and was a true fan of the arts,” the director added. “It was always a pleasure to have him and Freddie in the audience knowing how much he enjoyed all kinds of performances.”
In 1989 Erwin was awarded the Stony Brook Medal for Extraordinary Service and in 2001, an Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters. He also was honored at a 2006 “Stars of Stony Brook Gala.”
Erwin served on the Stony Brook Foundation’s board of trustees for more than 30 years and was founding chair of Stony Brook Foundation Realty, where he relentlessly advocated for a hotel on campus. It took 23 years, but a Hilton Garden Inn opened across from the Charles B. Wang Community Health Center in 2013. As a result, the road between the hotel and the administration building was named Erwin P. Staller Way.
The Stallers’ father-son tradition continued when Erwin’s son Cary joined the family business in 1984. Cary graduated summa cum laude from the University of Pennsylvania and went on to Harvard Law School, where he specialized in real estate and tax law.
By 2003, the Stallers owned and managed 50 shopping centers on Long Island, The New York Times reported. As some of the supermarkets closed, that space was subdivided into high-end stores, and entire shopping centers were remodeled, expanded, and updated. Erwin continued to work until 2017, when he was well into his 90s.
In 2018, Cary’s son Valentin joined the business, ensuring that Staller Associates continued to have a new father-son team at the helm. The company builds apartments, including one project in Port Jefferson Station and two complexes in Farmingdale.
In business, Cary said, his father “was the nicest guy… not your archetypical, hard-nosed businessman who was only in it for the money. He wanted to help people succeed,” Cary said in a Newsday interview, “and that gave him pleasure.”
Freddie, meanwhile, was dedicated to progressive causes as well as philanthropy in the arts, sciences, and social justice, her family said. She was a passionate skier, tennis player, and lifelong fitness enthusiast who traveled to every continent except Antarctica.
Erwin Paul Staller died February 11, 2019, at their Lloyd Harbor home. He was 97. Freddie died in 2023, ten days before her 100th birthday.
Their fund at The Trust furthers their commitment to serving Long Island nonprofits.