SAN JUAN CAPISTRANO –Tony Forster, the jovial, big-voiced former mayor of the city, whose family once owned Mission San Juan Capistrano, died this afternoon , two weeks after suffering an aneurism at his home. He was 71.
Forster died peacefully at 12:39 p.m. at Mission Hospital, surrounded by family and friends. The mission bells rang out at 3:15 p.m. as news of Forster’s passing reached city leaders.
“People say he was part of the fabric of the community, but no, he was one of the main threads,” said Mechelle Lawrence, the mission’s executive director. “He was San Juan thick and thin, mind, body and soul.”
A descendent of the oldest Anglo family in town, Forster’s great-great-grandfather once owned the mission, which be bought for $710. The Forster family lived in what is now the gift shop area for more than 20 years before President Lincoln gave the mission back to the Catholic Diocese in 1865.
His ancestors also owned all the land from the coast to the Santa Ana Mountains and from El Toro south to Oceanside, and their name is noted in San Clemente with the Forster Ranch community.
In San Juan Capistrano, three streets and a middle school bear his family’s name. Forster was the town’s mayor in 1970-71, grand marshal of the Swallows Day Parade in 1993, Man of the Year and co-founder of the Capistrano Boys & Girls Club.
Forster graduated from West Point, serving in the U.S. Army for six years. He later took part in a variety of businesses, including operating a RV storage facility and an automobile parts business. He most recently served as a member of the Cultural Heritage Commission and as president of the Historical Society for the last 15 years.
“He was very outgoing, very gregarious and extremely friendly,” said Don Tryon, vice president of the Historical Society. “He gave so much of himself. I really admired him because of that.”
Forster had been in critical condition for the last two weeks at Mission Hospital, after suffering an aneurism at his San Juan home on May 29. Doctors placed him in a medically induced coma after he underwent a three hour surgery.
Friends and community members have left more than 75 messages supporting Forster on a Web site his family has set up in his honor, located at www.caringbridge.org/visit/tony.
A memorial service will be held at 10 a.m. on Friday, June 22 at the Mission Basilica.
Contact the writer: 949-454-7329 or semery@ocregister.com
