Morton Blaustein

Morton K. Blaustein, chairman and chief executive officer of Baltimore's American Trading and Production Corp., and one of Maryland's richest men, died in December 1990 at a hospital in Richmond, Va., after choking on his food during dinner at a hotel there. Mr. Blaustein, who was 64, had been attending a meeting in Richmond of the board of directors of Signet Bank. He joined the Signet board when it took over the Union Trust Co., in which his company was a large investor. His father, Jacob Blaustein, and his grandfather, Louis Blaustein, were the founders of the old American Oil Co. American Trading and Production is the family business that owns oil tankers, oil and gas properties, communications, security and office products, manufacturing companies and real estate, including the Blaustein and W. R. Grace buildings in downtown Baltimore. It also owns large blocks of stock in the Crown Central Petroleum Corp. and the Amoco Corp. Associated with the company for more than 36 years, Mr. Blaustein had been chief executive officer since the death of his father in 1970. The Baltimore native chaired the board of overseers of the Department of Geology at Stanford University, and was a member of the boards of both the Park School and the Johns Hopkins University. He was a graduate of all three schools, earning his bachelor's degree at Hopkins and a master's and doctorate in petroleum geology at Stanford. He served in the Navy during World War II. Mr. Blaustein was on the boards of the Peale Museum, the Baltimore Civic Opera Company and the Committee for Downtown. He often participated with other members of the family in charitable gifts to Baltimore institutions, including the 1983 gift of paintings by John Singleton Copley and Benjamin West to the Baltimore Museum of Art and a $2.5 million gift to the Johns Hopkins Hospital in honor of his parents. This memorial to Jacob and Hilda Blaustein established a pain clinic at Hopkins. Mr. Blaustein is survived by his wife, the former Mary Jane Helms Lucas; two daughters, Susan Berlow of Manila, the Philippines, and Jeanne Bokor of New York City; a stepdaughter, Sandra Carter of Baltimore; a stepson, Taylor Lucas of Baltimore; two sisters, Barbara Hirschhorn of Pikesville and Elizabeth Roswell of Bridgewater, N.J.; and two step-grandchildren.