This oral history interview with Flavel W. Temple was conducted by Linda Watkins from April 30 to May 1, 1992, and by Jim Strassmaier at Temple’s office in Lake Oswego, Oregon, on October 13, 1992. Tapes 1 and 2 are missing, but their contents are included in an incomplete transcript. The interview was conducted in 3 sessions.

In this interview Temple discusses his family background and early life in Pendleton, Oregon. He speaks at length about running the Washington Hotel in Portland, and talks about racial discrimination in the hotel business and his reasons for being complicit in perpetuating it. He talks about his marriage to Hazel McBride in 1940, running a hotel during World War II, and his involvement with the Al Kader Temple of the Shriners. He speaks at length about learning to fly planes and his involvement with various aviation organizations; talks about his children, their families, and their careers; and discusses his involvement with the Al Kader Temple. He describes the car collision that killed his wife, Hazel Temple, and put him in the hospital for five months, and he talks about organizing the Oregon Restaurant Association during his recovery. He talks about his marriage to Rachel E. Boyce and his involvement with the Save Our Stadium committee. He discusses the changes in the hotel industry from 1932 to the time of the interview in 1992, as well as hotel associations that he was involved with. He speaks about his marriage to and divorce from Judith Evangeline Hoffman, and talks about their child. This interview contains an explicit description of a fatal car collision.