Title: Interview with Robert Block - #2

Original format: VHS

Item Id.: spl_ds_rblock_01_02

Description: This is part 2 of 2 of an interview with Robert Block. This interview was conducted by Donald Schmechel on July 30, 1987 at Block’s home.

Robert Block (1922-1996) was a managing partner of the accounting firm Laventhal and Horvath and an active civic leader in Seattle. Block grew up in Chicago and attended the University of Illinois. He served in the Navy during World War II and was stationed in Seattle which was where he met and married his wife, Marian Friedman. Over the course of his accounting career, Block acted as president of the Washington State Board of Accountancy, the National Association of State Boards of Accountancy and the Washington Society of CPA’s. Block was also active in his community, serving as president of Temple De Hirsh and vice president of the Seattle Opera.

During the interview Block discusses his life, his education, the many civic projects he has been involved with including METRO and the Seattle World's Fair, and his forays into politics, including running for the Seattle Port Commission.

This interview is part of the Donald Schmechel Oral History Collection. Don Schmechel, who was a member of the Seattle Public Library Foundation board, began this project with Seattle Public Library in 1984, with the Museum of History & Industry (MOHAI) brought on board as a partner in early 1985. Schmechel himself worked to raise the funding for the project, and volunteered his time to manage the project, and to conduct interviews along with a crew of volunteers. Originally titled the Videotaping Historic Figures (VHF) Program, the project interviewed 91 people, with a portion of the interviews entering the collections of the Seattle Public Library and a portion of them going to MOHAI.The interviews conducted with these Seattle civic, business and cultural leaders are valuable first-hand accounts that provide insight into developments taking place in the mid-twentieth century. 

Digitization of this videotape material has been made possible in part by a grant from the National Historical Publications and Records Commission.

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