ABOUT THE BOOK
This book of recollections deals primarily with events, places, and things. More important than any of these, are people. I should like, first, to speak of my parents, John Franklin Forbes and Portia Ackerman Forbes. It is sad that we did not understand each other more completely.
I have built, in my father’s memory, a stone bench on Mount Tamalpais, near the place where he and others of the Cross Country Club used to gather at about noon in the years around 1900, to listen to Miss Alice Eastwood, Curator of Botany at the California Academy of Sciences, read aloud the Sherlock Holmes stories, which were being published for the first time in this country in Collier’s Magazine. This bench, situated on a knoll southeast of Rock Spring, commands a magnificent view of the Pacific, the Golden Gate, and San Francisco Bay. I want to thank my mother for introducing me to the arts and for teaching me Greek.
I should next speak of my affection for the two dear women whom I have married: Margaret Funkhouser Forbes and Mary Elizabeth Lewis Forbes. Next, I would speak of my children, in chronological order: Pamela, Peter, and Michael. Next, I would speak of their children, also in chronological order: Alexander, Sophia Forbes McLane, Anne de Marcken, and Allegra Forbes. It would be impossible to list all the beautiful people in my life. I shall list only two names, knowing that this selection will not offend those not mentioned: these two are David Jameson McDaniel, and Byron Kightly Trippett.
Then, there are all the wonderful men and women who have either taught me, or been taught by me. The latter group may amount to almost 10,000 individuals.
