William Landau, Ethan Allen entrepreneur, dies at 81
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- July
- 6
William Landau, a businessman who established a successful small chain of independent Ethan Allen retail stores, including those in Hartsdale and Nanuet, died Thursday at his home in Fort Lee, N.J., at the age of 81.
Landau was born in the Bronx and served in the Medical Corpsman with the Combat Engineers of the 4th Armored Division of the Third Army in World War II. After the war, Landau graduated with a degree in accounting from City College.
Landau’s first furniture store was C.M. Whitney, which sold Early American style furniture in Union, N.J. He met Nat Ancell, a co-founder of Ethan Allen, in 1962 and opened the first freestanding Ethan Allen Gallery in River Edge, N.J.
Landau was a member of the Ethan Allen Retail Advisory Group. In 1998, Ethan Allen Chairman and Chief Executive Officer Farooq Kathwari awarded him a “Golden Kite� award for service to the company.
Today, W. L. Landau’s Ethan Allen Design Centers in Bergen County, N.J., and Westchester and Rockland counties is run by a partnership that includes a member of each of this three daughter’s families. One of his daughters, Pamela Connolly, lives in Pleasantville with her husband, David, and children, Jackie, Margot and Katie. Landau’s brother, Samuel Landau, lives in White Plains.
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on Friday, July 6th, 2007 at 4:39 pm by Julie Moran Alterio.
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