Edward Ferdinant Forsgard

Forsgard taught shooting at Rich Field, which began as cotton land. According to Wikipedia, the War Department took title on August 24, 1917, and about 3,400 workers, 1,000 of them Mexican, built the field. Twenty-five cadets arrived on Thanksgiving Day, and flight instruction began December 1. The field had 243 Standard J-1 trainers before the Curtiss JN-4 replaced them. Some 400 pilots earned their wings there. Named for Lt. C. Perry Rich, who died in a 1913 crash into Manila Bay, it closed in 1919, near today's Bosque Boulevard and 41st Street.

What the plaque says

Edward Ferdinant Forsgard Edward Ferdinant Forsgard was born to Swedish immigrants Samuel Johan Forsgard and Mary Johnson in 1870 at their home at 115 Bridge Street in Waco. Edward, known as "Fuzzy," was the only one of the Forsgard's six children to survive into adulthood; his parents and siblings are buried at Waco's First Street Cemetery. Edward followed in his father's footsteps, touring the country as a marksman and trapshooter by age eleven. He attended Baylor University, and, in 1896, married Annie Marie Weaver, who had come to the United States from England with her parents in 1880. Edward and Annie had six children and built a home at 1122 North 4th Street in Waco in 1908; Edward's widowed father lived behind their home in his own small house. Edward worked with his father, first at the family's bakery, restaurant and supply store on Bridge Street, and then at his father's Ambold's Sporting Goods Store. Edward also worked in a cotton yard as a cotton classer. At the outset of World War I, he became a shooting instructor for the military, working at Rich Field in Waco. He also later served as a special Texas Ranger and as a game and fish warden for McLennan County. In addition to his skill with a gun, another trait Edward shared with his father was his love of inventing, patenting an automatic dishwasher for restaurants, as well as a package tie, and a chemical and sawdust floor sweep design to absorb dirt and moisture. Internationally, Edward was known as an expert target shooter. He had competed in the sport for 50 years and held the world title in 1908. At this death in 1941, Edward was remembered locally not only as a trapshooter, but also as a patriot, friend and father. (2003)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Armstrong Browning Library — 1.0 mi
  A three-story Italian Renaissance library on the Baylor campus built to hold A. J. Armstrong's Browning collection, dedicated in December 1951 and now, by its own account, the world's largest of Browning material.
• Texas Ranger Hall of Fame and Museum — 1.7 mi
  The official state repository of Texas Ranger memorabilia, opened in 1968 in Fort Fisher Park on the Brazos, named for a Ranger post of 1837 whose site no one has located.
• Dr Pepper Museum — 1.9 mi
  The 1906 bottling plant of the Artesian Manufacturing and Bottling Company, built where Dr Pepper outgrew a Waco drugstore soda fountain, now the Dr Pepper Museum.
• Waco Suspension Bridge — 2.2 mi
  A Brazos crossing opened in January 1870 as the longest single-span suspension bridge west of the Mississippi, tolled until 1889, closed to vehicles in 1971 and now walked.

More markers nearby

• Neil McLennan — steps away
• Dr. Rufus Columbus Burleson — 0.3 mi
• Hallie Earle, M.D. — 0.3 mi
• Robertson — 0.4 mi