Louis Block was born in December 1926 in Chicago, Illinois. He grew up and went to school there. He lost his mother at age five. His father died at age 41. He and his sister were put into foster care with the Block family. They grew up in their home until he enlisted in the Navy. He enlisted because he did not want a letter [Annotator's Note: draft notice] from Uncle Sam [Annotator’s Note: Uncle Sam is the personification of the United States federal government, dating back to the 19th century, typically depicted as an older gentleman sporting a star-spangled top hat and red bow tie] telling him he would be in the Army. He chose the Navy on 1 December 1944. His boot camp was at Great Lakes, Illinois [Annotator's Note: Naval Station Great Lakes in Lake County, Illinois] for ten weeks. After boot camp, he was given a furlough [Annotator's Note: an authorized absence for a short period of time], and then sent to Storekeeper School in New York for about two months. Then he was sent to another school in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania for two months. In August 1945, he was ordered to Hawaii. He boarded a plane in Sacramento [Annotator's Note: Sacramento, California] and went to Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: Pearl Harbor, Hawaii]. He worked at the Navy supply depot in Pearl Harbor as a storekeeper. Their job was to preserve spare parts for ships and issue them to ships that would come into Pearl Harbor. They had the weekends off. They could sign up for a jeep on the weekends. He was stationed there for ten months. He got to see the island because of the jeep. He was discharged July 1946 on the points system [Annotator's Note: a point system was devised based on a number of factors that determined when American servicemen serving overseas could return home]. He was discharged in San Francisco [Annotator’s Note: San Francisco, California] and then he went home to Chicago.

Louis Block graduated from high school in June 1944. They discussed the war, but not at length. They were more focused on regular high school things and the war was secondary. They wondered why they were in the war and what they were doing there. Every day he would read about someone dying and leaving a family. He was 16 years old when he heard about Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941], but he does not remember where he was. He remembers when President Roosevelt [Annotator's Note: Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 32nd President of the United States] passed away. He was getting out of the shower in Pearl Harbor and it was announced. He felt like he had lost his father. He grew up with FDR [Annotator's Note: Franklin Delano Roosevelt]. He wanted to be in the military. He went to university the summer after graduation. He did not finish his fall semester because he went into the Navy. He majored in marketing. After the service, he went to UCLA [Annotator’s Note: University of California, Los Angeles in Los Angeles, California]. He worked at UCLA as a storekeeper for the ROTC [Annotator's Note: Reserve Officer Training Corps] for about 17 years. He saw the campus grow from a hole in the ground to a little city.

Louis Block knew they were going overseas, but they did not know where. The plane before them went to Guam. When they were up in the air they were told they were going to Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: Pearl Harbor, Hawaii]. When they got there they could not see any damage from 1941 [Annotator's Note: he is referring to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii on 7 December 1941]. He did not want to be in combat. He did not have "killer's instinct." He would tell his friends he saw the battle of the hula skirts. He had one friend who was stationed in Guam [Annotator's Note: Guam, Mariana Islands]. He did not correspond with them. He corresponded with a couple of girls in Chicago [Annotator's Note: his hometown of Chicago, Illinois] that he knew from high school. He was writing to two or three girls because he loved to get mail. One girl was his sweetheart. When he was discharged he went to California to go to school. She stayed in Chicago and their romance fizzled out. He did not know what his life was going to be. He eventually got married and had a daughter. While he was stationed at Pearl Harbor he met a girl. She was American. She was caucasian. She was in Hawaii because she was engaged to a young man that was an heir to an oil fortune. When the young man was discharged he left the islands. She called Block at the supply depot and told him the young man had left. She was the pursuer. For him to be an enlisted man with a girl from the mainland was unusual. Usually, only the officer dated the girls from the mainland. He dated her for about five months. When he was discharged he offered to write her, but it stopped when she went back to Texas. He was not in love with her. They both had a good time. He was lucky in the service. He did not see any action. He had a good job and had the weekends off. He was patriotic. He knew he would have to go in so he made the choice to enlist in the Navy. Before he went there he was told he had 30 days to get his affairs in order. When he signed up they gave him one day before he was sent to the Great Lakes [Annotator's Note: Naval Station Great Lakes in Lake County, Illinois].

Louis Block had to serve KP [Annotator's Note: kitchen patrol or kitchen police] duty for 30 days when he got to Hawaii. He was in the kitchen dishing out food and mopping the floors. He was approached by someone who worked in the chiefs and officers' mess and they asked if he would work with them. He agreed to work with them. He worked with them for 26 days. At night they played cards. All the chief petty officers were great guys. They made eggs, bacon, and hotcakes for the officers. Enlisted men usually dated the Hawaiian girls because the girls from the mainland drifted toward the officers. The Hawaiian girls were nice too. He was put on a personnel ship when he left Pearl Harbor [Annotator's Note: Pearl Harbor, Hawaii]. It took six days to get to San Francisco [Annotator's Note: San Francisco, California]. There were about 800 men on the ship. They played cards, ate, and slept on the way back to the United States. They did nothing for six days. When they got to San Francisco everyone cheered. Everyone had served their time and they were ready to go home. He had bad feelings more toward Nazi Germany than the Japanese because of the Holocaust. He read about Colonel Tibbits [Annotator's Note: later US Air Force Brigadier General Paul Warfield Tibbets, Jr.] who dropped the bomb [Annotator's Note: nuclear weapons dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan, 6 and 9 August 1945] and President Truman [Annotator's Note: Harry S. Truman, 33rd President of the United States] who had to make the hard decision of dropping the bombs. Truman said the bomb would save lives because it would end the war. The bomb maimed a lot of Japanese, but it saved countless lives. He could not have made the decision. He agreed with Truman that it would end the war. War is hell.

Louis Block used the G.I. Bill [Annotator's Note: the G.I. Bill, or Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944, was enacted by the United States Congress to aid United States veterans of World War 2 in transitioning back to civilian life and included financial aid for education, mortgages, business starts and unemployment]. He got his degree in marketing. He received 75 dollars a month. He lived on campus in a cooperative where everyone had a job to do in order to cut the rent. He went to two Navy schools. He was stationed in paradise. Being stationed in Hawaii was his most memorable experience. While he was there, he was given a seven day leave [Annotator's Note: an authorized absence for a short period of time]. He planned to go to Hilo [Annotator's Note: Hilo, Big Island, Hawaii] on the main island on 1 April. Then on 1 April there ended up being a huge tsunami that hit the island and almost demolished the town of Hilo. He heard about the tsunami before he left and decided to go to the beach of Waikiki [Annotator's Note: near Honolulu, Hawaii]. He stayed in a little hotel for a week. The tsunami was tragic. He decided to serve because he had to. Every able-bodied man that could serve had to. Joining the Navy taught him discipline, comradeship, and taught him to be a better citizen. He became more tolerant. He was happy to serve in the military. He answered the call. He felt very patriotic to do so. America is made up of many different personalities and religions. The American people do not want war. If there was a way to avert the war that would be the answer. He thinks museums are important. He thinks the war should be taught because it is a legacy to be followed.