HOW THE GALLERIA MISSED NEMAN’S, SAKOWITZ AND GEORGE POSTON

FOR A MAN who recently netted $15 million on a 29-acre land sale, George Poston is not very happy. That’s because
the land he sold will contain the Dallas Galleria, which Poston almost created twice. He wanted to be the daddy of
the project, and wound up being the rich uncle.

In fact, George Poston may be the unsung hero of the Galleria story, even though fate and fickle businessmen tweaked
him twice.

Poston was only 35 when he bought his 29 acres at LBJ and the Dallas Parkway, back in 1971. He knew he was looking
at the biggest deal in his 12-year real estate career.

The land was near LBJ, which Poston knew would be the main street for commercially booming North Dallas, as the Loop
had become for Houston. It was linked by good, fast highways to three airports: D/FW, Love and Addison. It was near
a warehousing area, and it was big enough for a mixed-use development like the one Hines was still expanding in
Houston.

To Poston, size was the key. Mixed-use centers have to be large enough to create their own tantalizing and
satisfying environments. Like atom bombs, they must have a critical mass. “You needed three major department stores
to create a regional shopping mall, and your major tenants to complete the retail center, and then a major hotel
with 400 to 500 rooms, and also the office space,” he says.

At the time, you also

needed water and sewer connections, a four-laned Alpha Road, and an extended Dallas North Tollway. When he wasn’t
cajoling Saks, Poston was cornering utilities officials and enticing smaller retailers. By 1974, he had everything
together.

“And then the recession hit, and when it hit, everybody pulled in their horns, and it didn’t jell.” So Poston held
on to the property for another four years, forking over the taxes and interest payments, and rode out the
recession.

By 1978, he was ready to go again, this time with Gerald Hines, who had been interested in a Dallas Galleria in that
vicinity since about 1974. “We had Saks Fifth Avenue ready to go, we had Sakowitz ready to go there, and Hines was
supposed to sign Marshall Field,” Poston says. “But Field’s decided in May or June of 1978 that they were going to
start with a center that already was successful, and since North-Park was the most successful center in Dallas, they
decided to go there.”

Neiman-Marcus, meanwhile, had a store in NorthPark already and was about to open another in Prestonwood, to which it
had been committed even before Poston put out feelers about having N-M at his mall.

Without a third major department store, the lenders would not finance Poston’s Galleria, and the partnership
agreement with Hines became null and void.

Sakowitz, of course, moved about a mile up the parkway and built at what is now called Sakowitz Village. Hines
forfeited a token amount of option money to Poston, who felt sick at having his dream development dashed by fickle
department store executives.

It was shortly after his deal with Hines cratered that Poston got an offer he couldn’t refuse. Bobby Lyle, then
president of Cornell Oil Co., was looking for investment land. He asked Rob Adair, a North Dallas realtor, to find
some for him – preferably something better than what Adair had shown him in the past. Adair talked to Poston and, in
negotiations that took all of the evening and most of the night, the two struck a deal: Poston would get about $14 a
square foot for the land. He had paid slightly more than $2 for each of those square feet.

“They just walked into my office at the right time,” Poston says. “They wanted the property for the same thing I
did, and they were very smart to realize its development potential.” In fact, Cornell was smart enough to buy
another 14 acres to the north that had belonged to Jack Vaughan. His estate was looking for a buyer.

Cornell was also very lucky. Shortly after it bought both pieces of property, Field’s was spurned by NorthPark.
Poston said it was because another store at the center blackballed Field’s; others say it was because Field’s wanted
to build too large a store. At any rate, Field’s came crawling back to Gerald Hines, and Hines asked Bobby Lyle if
he’d like to come to Houston and chat.

Hines talked about quality architecture, and how it made buildings more attractive, more prestigious, and more
marketable. “I liked him, I liked him a lot and was very impressed with him, and I think that the feeling was
mutual,” Lyle says. Toward the end of their conversation, he recalls, Hines asked, “Well, do you think we can
resurrect the Galleria?” The thought had crossed Lyle’s mind.

Poston’s earlier design still stands as a wall mural in the offices of the Henry S. Miller Co., which is leasing
space to retailers in the mall. Poston’s office is packed with pictures, maps, marketing studies and other Galleria
memorabilia. Poston himself is working on a huge new shopping mall with Federated Department Stores, but he still
thinks about the Galleria a lot.

“To me, then as now, it was an opportunity of a lifetime,” he says. “I doubt that anyone will ever have a better
location for a development like this. It has everything you could want. It was the crown jewel out there.”