With deep sadness we announce the peaceful passing of Ben Franklin Stahl at the Queen Elizabeth Hospital on Saturday, June 15, 2024. He was 91.

The award-winning artist immigrated to PEI in the early 90’s after Bantam Books asked him to illustrate the L.M. Montgomery’s novels beginning with her quintessential “Anne of Green Gables.”

He came to PEI to do research, fell in love with the place and bought a house in Belfast with his late wife, Pat Sorrells and continued to commute every month to NYC with his art. Ben is survived by his loving longtime partner Sally Cole, sons Keith (Mary) and Kees Stahl (Marion), daughter, Kathleen Stahl (Fred), sister Gail Stahl, sister-in-law Terry Sochet, grandsons Cody Stahl and Gary Grigg, his great-grandchildren, the extended Myers-Stahl family including David and Regina Stahl, dear friends Ann Sherman, Gail and Susana Rutherford, Gary Torlone, Norman MacDonald, Richard Vickerson and Vicki Armstrong.

Ben was predeceased by his wives Carolyn (Litchfield) Stahl and Pat Sorrells, his son Kurt (Kellen) Stahl, his mother, Margaret Eubank Stahl, and his father, Ben A. Stahl.

Born in Chicago in 1932, Ben moved to San Francisco in 1949 where he was soon drafted into the Army’s 21st Topographical Battalion at the Presidio in San Francisco. In 1955 he relocated his family to Connecticut, where for 17 years he taught figure drawing, portraiture, and composition at Famous Artist Schools in Westport, Connecticut, and later in Amsterdam, Netherlands where he led the school’s art department there. Upon his return to the United States, Ben provided for his family as a commercial artist living in Weston and eventually Litchfield, Connecticut where his first wife, Carolyn, died of cancer at the age of 44. It was as a commercial artist that Ben first ventured onto PEI, then chose to devote the past twenty years to the fine art painting of figures, landscapes, and abstracts which have been exhibited in East Hampton NY, Sarasota FL, Halifax NS and Charlottetown PEI.

No funeral service is planned. In Ben’s memory donations may be made to the Queen Elizabeth Hospital Foundation. His current work can be seen at Ellen’s Creek Gallery, Charlottetown, Avonlea Art Gallery in Cavendish and online with Gallery 18. Online condolences may be made at www.macleanfh.com