Susan Abby Wallen

Susan Abby Wallen passed away peacefully on June 13, 2025, surrounded by her loving family. Susi, as so many knew her, was born on December 12, 1938 in Brooklyn, New York, where she spent her early childhood before moving to Hewlett, New York, where she went to high school. She attended Goucher College in Baltimore, and this is where she met her husband, Dr. Bob Wallen, whom she married in 1960. The newlyweds moved to New York, where Susi earned her masters degree from Columbia Teachers College. Next they built a home in Setauket, New York and enthusiastically started their family in 1966. Susi raised her three energetic boys there, and began her career as an arts educator at the Museums at Stony Brook. She educated countless people there, and she also founded the Arts in the Classroom Program in the Three Village School District, introducing numerous children to an appreciation of the beauty of life captured by artists from all over the world and through various art styles.

Susi loved and supported other arts, including music and dance, and her home was filled with piano, clarinet, trumpet, guitar and trombone sounds through the years. She often brought her family to performances in Manhattan and at SUNY Stony Brook, instilling what became a lifelong appreciation of classical music, theater, and dance to her family. Her boundless energy and enthusiasm also led her development as a tennis player, a yoga practitioner, and a cross-country skier. What she loved the most was spending time exploring the sand bars and tidal pools along West Meadow Beach and taking the ferry over to Watch Hill Fire Island with her boys.

Also at the beach, Susi led a women’s group personally created spiritual prayers for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. This was a wonderful illustration of Susi bringing people together for the love of beach, friendship, and spirituality.

Susi showed amazing fortitude by beating breast cancer four times. She volunteered at multiple hospitals on Long Island, NY where she visited women in hospital while they were recovering from breast cancer related surgery.

Upon retirement, Susi and Bobby began summering in Beckett, Massachusetts where they enjoyed the summer-long music festival season with friends and family at nearby Tanglewood Music Center. Almost 20 years ago she moved with Bobby to Mt. Pleasant, South Carolina, where they found a warm welcoming community of like-minded retirees as they continued to travel around the world.

At the age of 80, Susi showed incredible inner strength and positivity while making a full recovery from total paralysis due to Guillain Barré Syndrome.

Susi is cherished by many - as a daughter, sister, wife, mother, aunt, grandmother, mother-in-law, friend, teacher, and colleague. Preceded in death by her parents Tess and Herbert Willner and by her brother Richard Willner. She is survived by her husband of 64 years, Bobby, and by her sons Benjamin and his wife Dorothy, Eric and his wife Stacey, and Matthew and his wife Mitzi, and by her grandchildren Irene, Lindsey, Alex, Asher, Teddy and Noa, and by several nieces, nephews, relatives and friends who will carry her radiant spirit and unflagging optimism forward in the world. In lieu of flowers, donations to honor Susi’s memory may be made to the Susan G Komen Breast Cancer Foundation. A memorial message may be sent to the family by visiting our website at www.jhenrystuhr.com. Arrangements by J Henry Stuhr Inc., Mount Pleasant Chapel.