Martin Halpern

Martin Halpern is the husband of newly appointed New York Attorney General, Barbara Underwood.

Martin’s longtime wife makes history as the first woman to hold the post, she is replacing Eric Schneiderman following his resignation after being accused by several women of abuse.

Born Barbara Dale Underwood on August 16, 1944; she graduated magna cum laude from Radcliffe College and received a law degree from the Georgetown University Law Center.

Barbara is also a former adjunct professor of law for both Yale Law School and at Brooklyn Law School. She served as Solicitor General for a decade and was previously Counsel and Chief Assistant to the United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York.

She’s also been happily married to the same man for decades. Meet Martin Halpern below.

#1 He is a Bronx native

Mr. Halpern was born in the Bronx, New York on October 3, 1929. The son of the late Mr. and Mrs. Louis Halpern of the Bronx. His father was a furrier in New York.

#2 He holds a Ph.D.

He graduated from the University of Rochester, from which he also received a master’s degree in English. He also received a doctorate degree in English from Harvard University. In 1997 he earned an M.A. at the Aaron Copland School of Music.

#3 He is a poet, playwright, librettist and composer

Martin Halpern is a published poet and a widely produced playwright; a librettist and an award winning composer. According to his website, there have been more than eighty performances of his vocal and chamber works and fifteen productions of his chamber operas in the New York area.  For all these operas he composed the libretto as well as the music.  He is also the recipient of eleven Meet the Composer grants and ten ASCAP-Plus awards.

#4 He is a former college professor

Martin Halpern taught playwriting and dramatic literature for twenty-nine years and chaired the department for seven of those years –at the Theater Arts faculty at Brandeis University. He had previously taught for four years at the English faculty of the University of California at Berkeley.

#5 He was married twice

Halpern was first married to Nancy Homer Halpern but the marriage ended in divorce. He then married second wife, Barbara Underwood in 1985, at the Music Barge at the Fulton Ferry Landing in Brooklyn –according to a NY Times announcement.

#6 He is the father of three adult children

From his first marriage he became the father to son Andrew, born in 1960; and a daughter Jessica, born in 1966. He and Barbara Underwood welcomed one son, Robert, born in 1986.