Robert P. Mayo (March 15, 1916 – January 25, 2003) was a director of the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territori ...

Office of Management and Budget The Office of Management and Budget (OMB) is the largest office within the Executive Office of the President of the United States (EOP). OMB's most prominent function is to produce the president's budget, but it also examines agency programs, pol ...

from January 22, 1969 until June 30, 1970. He was the last person to lead this agency under its former name of the Bureau of the Budget. Mayo was born in

Seattle, Washington Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest region ...

, the only child of Carl Asa and Edna Alberta (Nelson) Mayo. He attained a bachelor's degree in business from the

University of Washington The University of Washington (UW, simply Washington, or informally U-Dub) is a public research university in Seattle, Washington. Founded in 1861, Washington is one of the oldest universities on the West Coast; it was established in Seattl ...

in 1937 and earned a master's degree in economics from the school in 1938. He found employment with the Washington State Tax Commission as an auditor; he was soon promoted to become the organization's director of research. In 1941, Mayo joined the staff of the Department of Treasury. He began his work as an economic analyst. He eventually rose to the rank of assistant to the Secretary of Treasury for debt management. He left government in 1961 to serve as vice president of

Continental Illinois The Continental Illinois National Bank and Trust Company was at one time the seventh-largest commercial bank in the United States as measured by deposits, with approximately $40 billion in assets. In 1984, Continental Illinois became the largest ...

Bank with former colleague David M. Kennedy, who worked with him in the Department of Treasury. Mayo supervised the public affairs and trust investment operations of the bank. He also was a leader in efforts to develop black capitalism in Chicago. Known for his detail orientation and conservative views on spending from his time in Washington, Mayo was chosen in 1969 by incoming President

Richard Nixon Richard Milhous Nixon (January 9, 1913April 22, 1994) was the 37th president of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. A member of the Republican Party, he previously served as a representative and senator from California and was ...

to develop his initial policy budgets; Mayo was considered to be a proponent of Nixon's black capitalism programs, which were designed to boost the economic fortunes of African Americans through loans and investment in black-owned business. Mayo rubbed Nixon the wrong way and also bored the president during long meetings. Nixon soon took to avoiding meetings with him altogether until Mayo demanded a meeting, which the president granted in March 1970. At the meeting, Mayo made the mistake of complaining that John Ehrlichman, who was Nixon's chief domestic adviser, was ostensibly intruding on his turf and threatened to resign if his relations with the president didn’t improve, leading Nixon to conclude "I guess Mayo has got to go." In July 1970, Nixon appointed Mayo as head of the

Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago The Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago (informally the Chicago Fed) is one of twelve regional Reserve Banks that, along with the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, make up the United States' central bank. The Chicago Reserve Bank serves the Sevent ...

, which allowed him to return to his adopted hometown. He retired from this role in 1981. At the time of his death in 2003, he was a board member of the Chicago YMCA.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Mayo, Robert 1916 births 2003 deaths Directors of the Office of Management and Budget Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago presidents Nixon administration cabinet members