REASON Profile: Robert Poole, Jr.

The word that best describes 28 year old REASON editor Robert Poole, Jr. is busy. Like all of the REASON owners, he has a fulltime professional career in addition to his work on the magazine, and yet he still manages to enjoy a modicum of leisure activities.

Mr. Poole did his college work at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, earning a B.S. (1966) and an M.S. (1967) in mechanical engineering. He worked for Sikorsky Aircraft in Connecticut for two years, then moved to Santa Barbara, California to accept a position as a systems analyst with a local "think-tank". The firm is expanding into the criminal justice research field and Mr. Poole is currently involved in a project to design a model criminal justice system for a growing metropolitan area.

Mr. Poole first got involved in libertarian activities while at MIT where he was active in the Goldwater campaign and MIT's Radicals for Capitalism club. While on the East Coast he and his wife, Lynn Kinsky, attended various Objectivist functions in New York and Boston. During this time they began writing for REASON magazine, and shortly after moving to California they became involved in Reason Enterprises which ultimately bought REASON from its previous owner. Mr. Poole has written a number of articles for REASON and has been reprinted in THE FREEMAN, JOURNAL FOR THE STUDY OF CONCIOUSNESS and OUTSIDE LOOKING IN, edited by Dorothy James (Harper, Row, 1972).

Mr. Poole's major leisure time passion (aside from Ms. Kinsky) is model railroading. He is trying to find time to resume building cars and plans eventually to have an extensive O-scale layout. He also enjoys reading (economics, and science fiction), music (Mahler), gardening ("therapeutic"), playing with their three cats, and sitting around the pool soaking up sun and chatting with friends. In short, he seldom lacks for something to do, and is having a delightful time doing it!