Robert Morton Blumstein was born on May 9, 1936 in Upper Darby Hospital in Upper Darby PA, the day before Mother’s Day, an ongoing gift to his mother Jean (Jeanette Fuld), because his birthday always falls on or around Mother’s Day.
Although he didn’t remember much about his grandparents, he did get to know his grandfather Siegfried Fuld through his book collection, which Bob inherited. It included the works of O’Henry, Jack London, Mark Twain, among many others, and quite a few in German (which he couldn’t read), and all with a decidedly socialist bent. His Father, Les (Theodore Leslie), didn’t appreciate the collection and relegated its storage and use to the cellar, where it was eventually all but lost as mildew set in.
Bob’s greatest memory from grade school came in the third grade, when the Principal decided to correct his ‘lackadaisical attitude’ by demoting him to second grade, then to first, and finally to kindergarten. When she asked how he liked being sent back to kindergarten he replied: “I like it fine, they let us off at noon.” At which point, Bob remembers that “she blew her stack, being robbed of her lead,” and thereafter had him to report to her office for the rest of the day, which although he admits “took most of the fun out of it. I didn’t care one way or the other. This whole business lasted about two weeks” when the Principal said, “He’s hopeless, send him back to third grade.”
Bob fared better in Junior High, and High School as he was able to develop his own interests, even spending a little time on the football team. When Bob helped his father remove an air conditioning system he’d purchased from the Megow Model Airplane Company in Philadelphia, which was going out of business, Bob was able to fill the trunk of the car, a couple times over, with discarded model kits. This led him to a group of friends who’d formed “a self-made [model airplane] club…meeting in somebody’s basement every couple days…. And we opened the boxes, took out the balsa wood, went to work. And forgot about most, oh 80% of the time at least, forgot about any plans that were in there. We made our own. So it made us kind of free-thinkers. Of the three mainstay kids … all three ended up as engineers, two spent a good bit of time in the aerospace business.”
Later, in high school, he and his friend, Ross Nickerson, would frequent car dealerships “that were glad to get rid of old cars off of their lot, or if they were in some other business and had a car left over. They were all, in those days 25 bucks, basically, per car. Not, not necessarily really good, but you did a little bit of work on it, cleaned it up nice, you had something you could sell for 100 bucks…. So, we did a lot of that. The result was, my sister [Barbara] said I always had money in my pocket—she didn’t. A hundred dollars for something you managed to get an inspection sticker on, and wasn’t too dirty, was a good price,
After three semesters at The University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton Business school, Bob dropped out and joined the Air Force because “the type of training they had was clearly rated the highest of the services,” especially in his chosen field of engineering. He was assigned to Sheppard Airforce Base in Wichita Falls, Texas for training in “electrical/electronic aircraft and missile”, where he met Nancy Murphy at a dance. He was chosen to receive additional training as an instructor, so they were happily able to spend more time together. When he received his permanent assignment to Chanute Field in Illinois, the couple thought it prudent to part ways. But as soon as he arrived, he learned that he had been reassigned back to Wichita Falls. Bob and Nancy soon married, and had their first two children, Robert Leslie, and Lewis Siegfried.
After being honorably discharged from the Air Force, Bob and Nancy moved to Philadelphia where Bob found a job at Boeing as an Instrumentation Technician, in Experimental Flight Test, eventually being promoted to Project Engineer, while he and Nancy rehabilitated two houses, had three more children (Nancy Ann, Theodore Richard, and Gail Marie), and Bob continued to rehabilitate cars, and completed his Degree at Wharton at night.
After leaving Boeing he was recruited to be part of Westinghouse’s new advanced energy systems division, at Waltz Mill in Western Pennsylvania. … “to develop new sources of energy, or new ways of making energy, and it included some solar work, and wind work, and anything else you could think of, including a bit of a bite on the electric car. But the main thing I was being brought in for was a major entry into breeder reactor technology.” At the on-site interview, he noticed that all the engineers had either Masters, or Ph.D.’s. At the end of the visit the interviewer indicated that he would likely get an offer, so Bob asked, “Why do you want me?”, because he didn’t have an advanced degree, or publications, and he was told, “You’ve done something.” And in advising his children, and others Bob often pointed out that degrees that did not insist on any practical experience were often a real barrier to the work.
Bob accepted Westinghouse’s offer and the family moved to Greensburg, Pennsylvania where they rehabilitated another house, Bob rehabilitated any number of Saab 96’s (and many other cars to keep the family on the road), and Nancy spent several years working as an X-Ray Technician, while raising their children, eventually sending all five off to college. Bob and Nancy retired to Vero Beach, Florida, with Bob’s Saab Sonnet, his first hobby car since marrying. There Bob volunteered as an advisor to the Vero Beach Municipal Utilities, and Nancy volunteered at the McKee Botanical Garden for many years. Bob also continues his favorite past times of reading (mostly history), and building model airplanes from balsa wood and tissue paper.
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