This is a tribute to my loving mother and teacher of the ways of God and the Bible, who lectured each Monday night to about three-hundred women for fifteen years in Tacoma, Washington. She lectured at Central Baptist Church in the Bible Study Fellowship (BSF) Monday Night Womens Group, between the years between 1985 through 2000.
Eleanor Ruth Martin (Forbes) was born in Tacoma, Washington to Everett and Carrie Martin. Everett graduated from WSU in the 1920’s with a degree in Electrical Engineering. He met his wife Carrie Martin who worked at the Wenatchee Newspaper. Everett worked for Edison Electrical out of college and married Carrie and moved back to Tacoma. Mom was born in 1940 on February 14th (Valentine’s Day). She had an older sister name Gloria who was eight years older that her. As a child she was somewhat of a tom-boy. She liked to play baseball, and basketball, her father bought her baseball gloves. She went to Mary Lion Elementary school in Tacoma. She lived off “A Street” in Tacoma just off Pacific Avenue. She also liked to play “teacher” and would stand up at a makeshift black board in her room and work out problems and explain them to her imaginary students.
Later, she attended Stuart Junior High, and then attended Lincoln High School. There she played many after school sports and even filled in for her swimming teacher at times. She also learned to play the violin in orchestra. At sixteen years old, she began wearing lip stick and her grandmother called her “red lips.” In high school she began dating many boys. If she stayed out in the car talking to long her mother Carrie would flash a flashlight out the window at her.
After high school, she attended UPS College and earned a Teaching Degree (BA). She traveled to Europe in 1962 at twenty-two years of age and traveled for three months on 1,500 dollars. She played softball on an all-girls team. She was a member of the Alpha Phi Sorority. She learned to ice skate out at the Lakewood Ice Arena from her brother-in-law who was an ice hockey referee named Lenard.
During her college career she met my father Norman Forbes up at the Paradise Inn Lodge at Mount Rainier. My mother worked in the employee dining hall for three summers, including participating in a performance of Brigadoon at night for the guests in the lodge. My father hung out with two other men at night who came up from Longmire who worked hard all day and needed a break at night. He often read the newspaper at night in the upper balcony of the lodge. My mother met my father Norman when he was with two other fellows, and told one of them that she would like to meet him. Norman was four years older, and born in 1936 in Aberdeen, Washington. They decided to get married right after Eleanor graduated from UPS in 1962, and Eleanor got a job as a elementary teacher in the west Seattle school district. They both got an apartment in the Fauntleroy area of West Seattle, just up the hill from the Fauntleroy ferry.
She had two boys: Scott in 1967, and Howard in 1969, and lived in a house on East Hill Kent, Washington. Norman worked for Consolidated Freightways over the bridge in Tukwila. We had many good years as a family together and eventually moved up to Fife Heights in Tacoma. We had many fun years skiing up at Hyak, now Snoqualmie Summit East. We usually got the 11-7 ticket for 7 dollars. We packed our lunches in a Trapper Nelson backpack and usually ate tuna fish sandwiches and hot tomato soup. We also had many years hiking in the Cascades with my father who was a mountaineer and climbed Mt. Rainier two times. Eleanor attempted to climb Mt. Rainier once, but they got snowed when they stayed overnight at Camp Muir.
Mom went forward at a Billy Graham Crusade and accepted Jesus as her personal savior. Later, my father also went forward at another Billy Graham crusade at the Kingdom. We began attending First Covenant Church on Mildred Street in Tacoma around 1974. She made many friends and we where active in the church up through high school 1984. We attend a Keith Green free concert at the Field House on the UPS campus. Our family became fond of Keith Green’s music and ministry which I listen to, to this day. Her mother Carrie met a friend at Cannon Beach, Oregon who told her about Bible Study Fellowship (BSF). She went there several years and became a discussion leader. At some point she was recommended to become a Teaching Leader, and flew to San Antonio, Texas to received training. She was anointed to be a teacher of the Bible our Pastor Bob Berquist at First Covenant Church.
She was a Teaching Leader in Tacoma for fifteen years at Central Baptist Church and had a sanctuary of usually around three hundred to four-hundred women every Monday night she was lecturing to. She worked much of the week on each lecture, and the women especially liked her personal application of what she was teaching them. She made many lifelong friends, and helped lead many women into the Kingdom of God, and out of the chains of sin. She gave them hope and a new beginning, her testimony, applications, and interpretations of the Bible, will never be forgotten by many.
Eleanor had a very giving heart. She would do anything for her sons, me and Scott. We had five German Shepards, and she loved each one. We spent many summers at Lincoln City, Oregon. She and my father always had an open-door policy, no matter how old we were, so we could always come home and stay with them any time we need to. I had three friends in High School, who stayed with us at times because of their parent’s bad marriages.
Eleanor’s mother-in-law, Hope Forbes, a war-bride and whose husband was a general in WWII, struggled at times with her belief in God. My grandmother developed cancer at 80 years old, and my mother offered to take care of her. Before my grandmother died, Hope told my mother that she felt three taps on her shoulder on night while she was alone, and asked mom what that meant. Mom told her that, it was probably the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, telling her it was time to come home. My grandma went to be with the Lord soon after.
Mom was never a material person and kept a clean house that we lived in for 52 years. She was always happy and content with everything she had. One of my mother’s friends had a special needs daughter name Linda Prather, and on her mother’s deathbed request mom to promise to take care of Linda while she lived in an adult home.
Later, she attended Stuart Junior High, and then attended Lincoln High School. There she played many after school sports and even filled in for her swimming teacher at times. She also learned to play the violin in orchestra. At sixteen years old, she began wearing lip stick and her grandmother called her “red lips.” In high school she began dating many boys. If she stayed out in the car talking to long her mother Carrie would flash a flashlight out the window at her.
After high school, she attended UPS College and earned a Teaching Degree (BA). She traveled to Europe in 1962 at twenty-two years of age and traveled for three months on 1,500 dollars. She played softball on an all-girls team. She was a member of the Alpha Phi Sorority. She learned to ice skate out at the Lakewood Ice Arena from her brother-in-law who was an ice hockey referee named Lenard.
During her college career she met my father Norman Forbes up at the Paradise Inn Lodge at Mount Rainier. My mother worked in the employee dining hall for three summers, including participating in a performance of Brigadoon at night for the guests in the lodge. My father hung out with two other men at night who came up from Longmire who worked hard all day and needed a break at night. He often read the newspaper at night in the upper balcony of the lodge. My mother met my father Norman when he was with two other fellows, and told one of them that she would like to meet him. Norman was four years older, and born in 1936 in Aberdeen, Washington. They decided to get married right after Eleanor graduated from UPS in 1962, and Eleanor got a job as a elementary teacher in the west Seattle school district. They both got an apartment in the Fauntleroy area of West Seattle, just up the hill from the Fauntleroy ferry.
She had two boys: Scott in 1967, and Howard in 1969, and lived in a house on East Hill Kent, Washington. Norman worked for Consolidated Freightways over the bridge in Tukwila. We had many good years as a family together and eventually moved up to Fife Heights in Tacoma. We had many fun years skiing up at Hyak, now Snoqualmie Summit East. We usually got the 11-7 ticket for 7 dollars. We packed our lunches in a Trapper Nelson backpack and usually ate tuna fish sandwiches and hot tomato soup. We also had many years hiking in the Cascades with my father who was a mountaineer and climbed Mt. Rainier two times. Eleanor attempted to climb Mt. Rainier once, but they got snowed when they stayed overnight at Camp Muir.
Mom went forward at a Billy Graham Crusade and accepted Jesus as her personal savior. Later, my father also went forward at another Billy Graham crusade at the Kingdom. We began attending First Covenant Church on Mildred Street in Tacoma around 1974. She made many friends and we where active in the church up through high school 1984. We attend a Keith Green free concert at the Field House on the UPS campus. Our family became fond of Keith Green’s music and ministry which I listen to, to this day. Her mother Carrie met a friend at Cannon Beach, Oregon who told her about Bible Study Fellowship (BSF). She went there several years and became a discussion leader. At some point she was recommended to become a Teaching Leader, and flew to San Antonio, Texas to received training. She was anointed to be a teacher of the Bible our Pastor Bob Berquist at First Covenant Church.
She was a Teaching Leader in Tacoma for fifteen years at Central Baptist Church and had a sanctuary of usually around three hundred to four-hundred women every Monday night she was lecturing to. She worked much of the week on each lecture, and the women especially liked her personal application of what she was teaching them. She made many lifelong friends, and helped lead many women into the Kingdom of God, and out of the chains of sin. She gave them hope and a new beginning, her testimony, applications, and interpretations of the Bible, will never be forgotten by many.
Eleanor had a very giving heart. She would do anything for her sons, me and Scott. We had five German Shepards, and she loved each one. We spent many summers at Lincoln City, Oregon. She and my father always had an open-door policy, no matter how old we were, so we could always come home and stay with them any time we need to. I had three friends in High School, who stayed with us at times because of their parent’s bad marriages.
Eleanor’s mother-in-law, Hope Forbes, a war-bride and whose husband was a general in WWII, struggled at times with her belief in God. My grandmother developed cancer at 80 years old, and my mother offered to take care of her. Before my grandmother died, Hope told my mother that she felt three taps on her shoulder on night while she was alone, and asked mom what that meant. Mom told her that, it was probably the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, telling her it was time to come home. My grandma went to be with the Lord soon after.
Mom was never a material person and kept a clean house that we lived in for 52 years. She was always happy and content with everything she had. One of my mother’s friends had a special needs daughter name Linda Prather, and on her mother’s deathbed request mom to promise to take care of Linda while she lived in an adult home.
My mother Eleanor Forbes, has appeared to have gone missing since October 18th, 2024. I, Howard Forbes her son, who was her care-giver for the last seventeen years since my father Norman Forbes passed away with Pancreatic Cancer, have spent the last four months trying to protect my parents house, from being stolen by drug addicts that have moves across the street about a decade ago. We have been though many horiffic events, and I went back to the east coast to find intervention for her in Washington DC, upon returning have not been able to find her anywhere.
Upon returning, I have been locked out of the house illegally, and my mother Eleanor at eighty-four years of age has disappeared. I have reason to believe that she is gone from us. I plan to update this site as a tribute to her, to make sure that she is not forgotten to all of us that loved her.
I plan to organize a tribute to my mother's wonderful life, who has led many believers into the Kingdom of Christ, and given all of us hope, and an eternity with Jesus Christ our Savior!