Herman Frederick Newblock

Herman Frederick Newblock was an American politician, Ku Klux Klansman, and police officer who served as the 16th and 19th Mayor of Tulsa from 1922 to 1928 and 1932 to 1934.

He is one of two mayors, the other being John O. Mitchell, who served non-consecutive terms. According to the city of Tulsa, he was known as "Tulsa's Grand Old Man of Politics" and Newblock Park is named after him.

Biography Herman Frederick Newblock was born on January 12, 1867, in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, to Henry Newblock and Elizabeth Wagner. Newblock's family moved to Missouri, Fayetteville, Arkansas, Falls County, Texas, before settling in Cleveland County, Oklahoma Territory in 1894.

He became the sheriff of Cleveland County in 1895. He briefly operated a hardware store in Sulpher, Chickasaw Nation before settling in Tulsa in 1905. He was appointed Tulsa's police chief in 1907 and served until October 1908 when he was appointed to succeed Lon Lewis as Tulsa County sheriff. In 1911 he left the sheriff's office to return to his previous position as chief of police. He left again in 1914 to work for Producers National Bank until 1917. From 1917 to 1921 he was Tulsa's finance commissioner.

Family He married Addie Gardner on March 4, 1897.