Lynn Martens — dancer, dance teacher, Pilates instructor, small business owner, mother, grandmother, lifelong devotee of New York City and singular sensation — died on Friday, August 22, 2025, in her adopted home of South Burlington, Vt., due to acute complications of chronic illness. She was 80 years old.
Born in New York City on December 15, 1944, to first-time parents Marian Chester Walsh, a schoolteacher, and William Walsh, a physician then employed by the U.S. Navy, Lynn (who went at times by Lyn or Lynne) spent her childhood moving around the country in tandem with her father’s transfers. These eventually led her back to Manhattan and the Professional Children’s School, where her passion for dance flourished as she earned her diploma.
To her mother’s initial consternation, Lynn deferred her enrollment at NYU to spend a year abroad in Paris. A confirmed Francophile, Lynn claimed to have read Sartre’s Being and Nothingness at 16. During her later years she attended a French conversation group in Burlington.
Back in New York, Lynn attended NYU for a semester, pursued a dancing career (including a stint with Paul Taylor’s company), attended Columbia for a semester, and then put both career and school on hold to begin a family. Her tenacity triumphed, as it often did, when she completed her history BA, summa cum laude, at C.W. Post in 1985.
In late 1967 Lynn met actor Wayne Martens during rehearsals for King Solomon and Ashmedai, in which she danced and he portrayed the eponymous demon of lust. Soon thereafter she moved into his Brooklyn apartment, from which the pair didn’t move until 1977, by which time they were married and had three children in tow. In the meantime she spent a summer in Israel, took classes at Columbia, did a lot of high-quality mothering and helped Wayne build a successful custom photo lab, Box One Photographic.
The family settled on Long Island, first in East Norwich, then in Greenlawn. Lynn, a voracious reader of literary novels and historical nonfiction, kept the house full of books. By night she enjoyed listening to jazz LPs. Her wide-ranging cultural and intellectual curiosity set an irresistible example for her children.
Dance was the heart of Lynn’s life. She took classes for as long as she could and taught ballet and jazz for years at various Long Island studios, most notably the North Shore Studio of Dance.
Lynn’s politics were strongly progressive. Spurred by the moral fervor of the anti-war and women’s liberation movements of her youth, she participated in numerous local and national demonstrations over the decades, addressing such issues as apartheid, reproductive freedom, the Iraq war and threats to democracy.
In the summer of 1995, Lynn realized her long-harbored dream of moving back to Manhattan. She and her family saw out the century in a Houston Street apartment that, in later years, Lynn cited as her favorite among the many homes she’d known. During this period she discovered, and created a career for herself in, the discipline of Pilates, well known among professional dancers but then gaining popular traction.
Pilates changed everything. When the Houston Street apartment had to be sold, Lynn found not only the courage but the wherewithal to leave her long-troubled marriage. She moved first to Washington Heights and then to Vermont. After working for a year with her daughter, Shannon, owner of the Pilates Den, Lynn founded her own studio, Absolute Pilates, where she made her living — and fostered a coterie of fond, loyal clients — until COVID shutdowns and her own declining health gradually drew things to a close.
Even as Alzheimer’s and a string of health emergencies slowed her down, Lynn continued pursuing the many interests still accessible to her, including her French group, the NYC-based writing group she’d participated in for years, and visits with siblings and friends. Almost until the end, she read the Times and the New Yorker, listened to jazz, and complained about politics. Above all, she maintained an ever-curious, often hilarious, reliably sympathetic presence in the lives of those she loved and who loved her.
Predeceased by her parents, Lynn is survived by a devoted cohort of children, grandchildren and siblings, including her daughter, Shannon Lashua of Williston, Vt.; sons Matthew and Christopher Martens of Beverly, Mass., and South Burlington, Vt., respectively; grandchildren Jami and Emma Lashua of Williston, Vt.; sisters Gail Jennings and Claire Locke of Ann Arbor, Mich., and Hillsborough, N.C., respectively; brother William Walsh of Waltham, Vt.; and feline companion Gigi.