Peter Jost Blake

Record status: unconfirmed. Class-roster match confidence is medium. Correct the infobox if you have a source, and note it on talk.

Peter Jost Blake
Personal details
Born	1920 Berlin, Germany. In
Died	5 December 2006
Nativity	Germany
Religion	Jewish
Military service
Allegiance	United States
Branch	United States Army
ASN	0929736
Rank	Private First Class
Camp Ritchie	Class 23 (25 September – 23 November 1944)
Section	5A
Team	MII 440-G

Teammates

Team — MII 440-G

These are other soldiers listed on the same team roster. People moved between teams; overlapping service dates are not always documented.

Research notes on this page are compiled from the source file and later edits. They may be unverified, incomplete, or incorrect, and should not be treated as established fact. Please correct the article or add sources on the talk page. For class-roster terms, see About the data.

Sources & confidence: Treat Research notes as leads, not settled fact. Prefer NARA, the class roster, newspapers, Find a Grave, or published histories for contested claims. Mark unsourced claims with {{Needs source}}, or explain disagreements on talk. Baseline import notes: About the data.

Peter Jost Blake (1920–2006) was a Ritchie Boy (from Germany; Jewish) who trained at Camp Ritchie in class 23.

Biography

Peter Jost Blake (born Peter Jost Blach; 1920–2006) was born in Berlin, Germany. In 1933 his parents sent him to England after the Nazi regime came to power; they followed later.

In 1938 he began studying at the University of London, and the following year he entered the Regent Street Polytechnic School of Architecture in London. He immigrated to the United States in 1940 and enrolled in the University of Pennsylvania's architecture program, becoming a protégé of Louis Kahn in Philadelphia. In 1975 he became chairman of the Boston Architectural Center, then in 1979 joined the Department of Architecture and Planning at The Catholic University of America, serving as department chairman from 1979 to 1986 and remaining until his retirement in 1991.

He also taught architecture at colleges and universities in the United States and abroad.

Citizen, changed his surname to Blake, enlisted in the U.S.

Army, and trained at Camp Ritchie, Maryland, as an intelligence officer.

In 1944 he became a naturalized U.S. He remained in the army until 1947, returned to New York, and in 1948 was named curator of architecture and design at the Museum of Modern Art. He earned a bachelor's degree in architecture from the Pratt Institute in 1949.

In 1950 he became an associate editor at The Architectural Forum, later rising to editor-in-chief, and left in 1972 for a similar post at Architecture Plus. He served in Europe and was among the first U.S. Troops to enter Berlin after Hitler's death.

Alongside editing he practiced architecture, wrote books on the subject, and became known as both a practitioner and a critic of Modernism. After retiring he moved to Connecticut and continued to write, including regular columns for New York magazine and Interior Design.

He died on 5 December 2006.

Research notes

• OSS
• Noted architect

Technical record

Field	Imported value
Approx Age at Death	86
Class_ASN	32996525
Class_Name	BLAKE, Peter J.
match_method	pass2_unique_name
row_source	both

Sources

• Camp Ritchie Museum, Inc. (The Ritchie History Museum), Classes 1–31 roster data
• Dan Gross research spreadsheets, including original Excel timeline/roster work, combined with other research and records
• NARA World War II Army enlistment records (where a NARA ASN is present)
• 1940 U.S. Census (where a census match is present)
• Ritchie Boys of WWII Facebook page, post dated 2022-12-09 (1 post)