Early Life
Herb Bernstein was born and raised in Brooklyn, NY and was a star basketball player in high school and college. He attended Southern Methodist University on a basketball scholarship, then earned his B.S. and M.A. in Education at New York University. He briefly played professional basketball for the Milwaukee Bucks.
He went on to become a basketball coach and teacher in the New York City School system (at Midwood High School and Eastern District High School), where his day to day encounters with "special students" was the topic of conversations with his friend and fellow teacher Gabe Kaplan. Those conversations led to the widely popular '70s TV series Welcome Back, Kotter. The characters and their antics were largely based on Bernstein's students and experiences.
Bernstein always dabbled in music, starting with violin lessons at the age of four. He later learned piano and played in bands until he broke into the record business full-time in the mid-1960s.
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