Tuesday, February 22, 2011
By Kathy Daley
LIBERTY—Lawrence Stier graduated from the best law school in the nation but he didn’t flaunt it and those he encountered wouldn’t have guessed it.
“Larry was friendly, warm and low-key, so most people had no idea he graduated from Harvard Law School,” said local attorney Garry Greenwald.
“He was a superb attorney, very, very bright, a fabulous judge and a decent man,” Greenwald noted. You could tell when had to sentence someone to jail that it was difficult for him. But he knew that he had to apply the law.”
Stier, age 83, of Liberty died Sunday morning of complications from cancer.
He was a former Liberty councilman who had also served as Liberty town justice and, for 15 years, as Liberty village justice. Then, as assistant county attorney, he handled the legal work for the construction of Sullivan County Community College in Loch Sheldrake.
Stier’s pro-bono work for the community was also significant, said longtime friend and colleague Gerald Orseck. “Larry was very interested in the community, and it showed in his public service work for the hospital and the synagogue.”
For three decades, Stier served on the Board of Directors for the hospital that eventually became Catskill Regional Medical Center. He was board president in the 1970s when the Harris hospital was built.
A member of Congregation Ahavath Israel, he served on the board and on the building committee that planned and constructed the Chestnut Street synagogue.
“I’ve known Larry since I was 10 years old, and that was 68 years ago,” said Orseck. His brother Harold went to school with me. I remember when Larry came home from the Army, where he had served with the post0World War II occupation forces in Italy.”
“Hardly a week goes by that I don’t talk to Larry,” Orseck said. “It was just a couple of weeks ago that I saw him and his wife Dorothy having dinner at Piccolo’s,” a Liberty restaurant on Route 52.
Stier grew up around his parents’ Ferndale hotel of the family name, and when they died, he operated the business for a number of years. One of the Catskill’s famous family-run places, Stier’s Hotel saw rafts of summer visitors from 1920 to 1973.
But it was for his legal mind and experience, and for his kindness and decency, that the Stiers’ oldest son Larry will be remembered.
“Forty years ago, when I started practicing law, Larry was older than me and well established in Liberty,” said County Treasurer Ira Cohen. “He was very helpful to us who were coming along in the profession. When you graduate from law school and start practicing, it’s not end of learning, but the beginning and Larry was anxious and willing to give advice to young lawyers. I was very fond of him. He was a real gentleman, a very nice man.”
“It’s a great loss,” echoed Gary Greenwald. “I truly admired him. He was a real Liberty country boy with a great sense of humor, a joke, a glint in his eye. He was like everybody’s favorite uncle.”