Bloch, Robert

Robert Albert Bloch was born in Chicago. He moved with his family to Milwaukee in Wisconsin when he was ten years old. His mother was a social worker and his father worked in a bank. Bloch was a great admirer of H.P. Lovecraft; he had discovered Weird Tales, which included Lovecraft’s stories, when he was a teenager. Bloch eventually dared to write to Lovecraft, who replied to his letters, and over a period of several years Lovecraft was his literary mentor. Bloch married Marion Ruth Holcombe in 1940. He got a job at an advertising agency while she was waiting their first child, and he continued to work for the same firm until 1953. When his wife became ill, they moved to Wisconsin to be near her family. They moved to Hollywood in 1960, but the marriage was breaking up, and they separated after only a short period there. Bloch married Eleanor Alexander one year after the divorce. He died in Los Angeles of cancer.