Linda U. Margolin is celebrating two 50th anniversaries this year. In January 1976, she was sworn in as a lawyer in New York; later that year, she and her husband moved to the Three Villages.
Linda grew up in Manhattan, graduated from Hunter College High School and was an honors graduate of Willliam Smith College (Phi Beta Kappa) and New York University Law School (Order of the Coif). She began her legal career as a law clerk to a federal judge, and following that clerkship, she and her husband opened their own law practice in Smithtown. Since that time she has been in private practice and is currently a partner in the East Hampton law firm Ackerman, Pachman, Goldstein & Margolin, LLP. After many years as a commercial litigator, she now concentrates her practice on land use, real estate and zoning.
She is a member of the Suffolk County Bar Association where she has served as a director and a member of various committees, and of the New York State Bar Association where she has served as a member of the House of Delegates, chair of the General Practice Section and co-chair of the Land Use and Environmental Law Committee of the Real Property Section. Working within the Suffolk County Bar Association, she helped establish the Commercial Division of the Supreme Court in Suffolk County and for several years, was a contributing author to the prestigious treatise, “Commercial Litigation in the New York State Courts.” In addition, she has lectured on federal practice, land use and zoning and commercial topics for both the Suffolk Academy of Law and the state bar.
She has also given back to her community in other ways. She has served as the Chair of the Suffolk County Chapter of the New York Civil Liberties Union and as Judge Advocate for the Setauket Yacht Club (now the Port Jefferson Yacht Club). She was a longtime trustee of the Long Island Museum of Art, History and Carriages as well as its chair and currently serves as a Trustee Emeritus and as the community member of the museum’s Collections Committee. Over the past year, she has provided pro bono legal services to the Ward Melville Heritage Organization to assist in navigating the complex legal challenges involved in restoring the mill pond, dam and Harbor Road.
Linda and her husband Robert live in Setauket where she spends her “spare” time sailing and gardening. They are the proud parents of two sons and the joyful grandparents of a three-year old granddaughter.