Robert Forster ~ Index
Robert Forster, son of Ralph and Margaret McCullough Forster was born in Wingate Grange, Durham County, England, March 30th 1853. The twelfth of March 1854 his parents set sail for America on the ship called John M. Wood. They had quite a stormy voyage. They crossed the plains by ox-team and his parents went to live at the foot of the Twin Peaks in Cottonwood Canyon. In the year 1859 he came with his parents to Mendon, Cache Valley, which at that time was called a fort.
In the spring of 1864 a town plat was surveyed and the families began moving onto their city lots. Although just a small boy he well remembers the night when Colonel Patrick E. Conner and his soldiers camped in the Mendon Fort on their way to Battle Creek to fight the Indians. It was a bitter cold night and they could hear the wagons screeching on the hard snow for a long distance. And after that the Indians was more friendly with the people so they moved onto the town lots.
He often laughed about when he and some more little boys, was out heading sheep a big wind came up and raised a dust, they thought it was Indians coming, so they left their sheep and run for home badly frightened. Later on they became more friendly and he and his playmates would go up on a hill just west of Mendon and there was a deep ravine and the little Indians would get on one side and they on the other, and with long switches with mud dob's on the end, they would throw mud at each other just for fun.
He would also tell us how the crickets and grass hoppers destroyed the crops. They would get out in crowds and scatter straw, then tie something on a stick and drive them onto the straw and set fire to the straw, in this way they destroyed a great many.
He well remembered when the (Utah Northern) railroad came into the valley in 1872. And in January 1873 they built the railroad from Mendon into Logan. It was a mild winter so they cut willows and hauled them, then they hauled dirt to cover the willows so they could lay the ties, as some places the ground was very swampy and that is how they built it into Logan.
He has often remarked what a difference there is in farming today and when he was a boy. He cut the hay with a scythe and raked it with a wooden rake and cut the grain with a cradle and bound it by hand. As modern machinery came along he was always ready to invest as woking with machinery was one of his hobbies, and he did lots of his own blacksmithing. He also did carpenter work, this kind of work seemed to come naturally to him and was always willing to help others.
He was mayor of Mendon City for two terms and city councilman for twenty years. Helped to get the water system and electric light in Mendon. Was a lover of fine horses and cattle. When they had the racetrack in Mendon, in the early days, he helped to build it.
He also had a good memory of dates of early days. He was with his parents when they was having the big Twenty-Fourth of July celebration at Brighton, when word came the soldiers were coming (Utah War). He was blessed with that noble pioneer spirit and his word was as good as a bond. He passed January 26th, 1946.