Folster, George Thomas

George Thomas Folster was born on 27 June 1893 in Rat Portage (now Kenora), Ontario. He was the son of Henry Folster and Catherine Muggaberg who had moved to the region from Manitoba in the early 1890’s. His siblings included ten sisters: Alice Jane (b. 1879), Isabella (b. 1881), Fanny (b. 1883), Catherine (b. 1886), Jemima (b. 1889), Clara (b. 1891), Mary (b. 1895), Dina (b. 1899), Ethel (b. 1901) and Lottie (b. 1903); and two brothers: John Henry (b. 1887) and Wilfred (1901-1901). In the 1901 census his father’s occupation was listed as “day labourer”. His father died of tuberculosis in 1905. On the 1911 census George was living with his mother and two youngest sisters in the north ward of Kenora. His mother remarried the following year, taking Joseph Moore as her second spouse.

When conscription went into effect in Canada in 1917, George was drafted for service in WW1. He passed his medical exam on 23 November 1917 and was declared fit with a classification of A2. He signed his attestation papers in Port Arthur, Ontario on 10 January 1918 and was placed with the 1st Depot Battalion, Manitoba Regiment, H Company. George was granted a “conditional leave until he ceases to be employed as a farmer”. His official discharge from the CEF was on 30 January 1919.

George continued to farm in the Jaffray Mellick area, north of Kenora, in all totalling about 40 years. He died on 10 November 1967 at his home on Rabbit Lake Road. At the time of his death he was survived by his sisters Mary Bailey, Diane Holmstrom, and Charlotte Faulkner of Kenora, and his brother John Folster of Port Arthur. George is interred in the Lake of the Woods Cemetery in Kenora, his grave unmarked.

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