The third-generation owner of the former EO Media Group, Michael Aldrich Forrester, passed away in Bend on February 3 at the age of 86. Forrester served as editor of The Daily Astorian, the East Oregonian, and the Capital Press, which he also published, throughout his lengthy tenure with the organization.
After a protracted battle with Parkinson’s disease, he passed away.
Forrester, the son of J.W. Forrester and Eleanor Aldrich Forrester, was born in Corvallis in September 1938. On the same day, Eleanor and her sister Amy delivered birth. Jacqueline Bedford Brown, that cousin, passed away before Mike in 2009. Steve, the surviving third-generation proprietor of the family’s newspaper business, is Forrester’s brother.
Mike Forrester graduated in 1956 from Pendleton High School and in 1960 from the University of Oregon.
Forrester’s appointment as a United States Senate page was a distinctive feature of his education. Forrester, the first Senate page from Oregon in four decades, was sponsored by Senator Richard L. Neuberger of Oregon.
He later talked of having a close-up look at Sen. John F. Kennedy and Vice President Richard Nixon. At the University of Oregon, Forrester established Students for Kennedy during the 1960 presidential campaign after being captivated by Kennedy’s magnetism. Forrester talked about spending a day in Albany and at Oregon State University with Kennedy during the campaign trail in an interview with Kathy Aney of the East Oregonian in 2015.
I attempted to make light of the notion of an Oregon student introducing him at Oregon State because I was essentially winging it at Gill Coliseum. We can agree on one thing, I added after sort of fumbling for words, and I heard Kennedy say, “That’s a good one,” behind me. I used a line that he approved of.
Forrester’s sport was track. He spent two years running the hurdles for the renowned coach Bill Bowerman at Oregon. The Doyle Higdon prize, which honored achievement in both academics and athletics, was given to Forrester.
Forrester was a teammate of Phil Knight, who went on to develop Nike, on the track team and on the Oregon Daily Emerald crew. In junior year, Forrester co-edited the Emerald. Knight worked in the sports section of the newspaper.
Forrester was employed by the Coos Bay World, the Eugene Register-Guard, and The Associated Press in Los Angeles before entering the family business. Before Cassius Clay became Muhammad Ali, Forrester was dispatched by the AP to interview him at Los Angeles International Airport.
On January 1, 1969, he was appointed editor of The Daily Astorian. Mary Buchanan Gramson of Warrenton was Mike’s wife. Melissa Gramson was adopted by Mike, and they had a son named Robert Aldrich Forrester.
In 1973, Mike’s family moved to Pendleton, where he was appointed editor of the East Oregonian, while his mother and father moved to Astoria, where J.W. Forrester was appointed editor of the Astorian.
Forrester told Aney about his approach to managing the newsroom: I had a lot of journalistic passion and a type A mentality. I adored it. I went overboard. I worked long hours. I was quite neurotic and obsessive.
I regret not trusting journalists’ intuition and being harsh with them. They performed well.
Forrester spent 17 years in Pendleton before relocating to Salem to take a position as editor of the Capital Press, which the family had just purchased. Mike and his wife, Mary, got divorced while they were living in Pendleton.
Mike married Pamela Holfert Collins in Salem in 1989. Mike and Pam relocated to Pendleton after retiring. To be nearer to Pam’s son Timm Collins and his family, they relocated to Bend in 2019. Mike passed away in 2021, but Pam died first.
In addition, his mother passed away in 2007 and his father in 2000. In 2024, Carpenter Media Group purchased EO Media, the family business.
Mike Forrester is survived by his brother Steve, nephew Harrison Aldrich Forrester, niece Susan Forrester Rana, and their children Zoya Mathis Rana, Taj Edwin Rana, Skye Robert Forrester, and Rhody Lee Forrester. He also has stepsons Timm, Mike, and Dan Collins, as well as grandchildren Osa Forrester Lange and Drew Norton.
The Daily Astorian, Ore., 2025. Go to the Daily Astonian website. Tribune Content Agency, LLC is the distributor.
