Wilma Forester

About the Author and the Artist- Wilma Rae Anderson, Rolls, Forester

“Wilma you are going to get an A on the story you wrote in your High School English Class”
said, my teacher. Wow, I didn’t get many A’s so I was surprised and pleased. “Maybe someday you
will become a writer,” she continued. I didn’t think so I was too much into riding and training my
horse and chasing boys.
I was born in Los Angeles, California in 1933 and we had NO books at home to read. Most
books were very expensive and our family just could not afford anything like that. Then one day
my father bought a new set of encyclopedias’ called The Book of Knowledge. There were at least
ten books and even at five years old I loved every one of them. I would spend hours going
through the pages and studying the pictures and enjoying the Aesop Fables.
We, ( the Anderson family, mom dad, and three kids plus our dog Boogie) move to Chico,
California in 1940 or so. We lived in several different places and finally settled in the barren
wastelands of a part of town called Pleasant Valley. Ours was the only house on the left side of
Cactus Avenue. My older brother and sister (Clinton, and Barbara,) and I walked the two miles to
the one-room school Pleasant Valley on East Avenue. It was great horse country and easy access
to Bidwell Park. I am still writing stories about my many adventures in the Park.

I married young and had two sons and a daughter, James Steven, (deceased) Gene Jeffery and
Brenda Jean. Our family moved to forest Ranch, California in 1964. My name is now Wilma Rae
Forester. I have trophies and ribbons from riding a painting but being a Christian: To you O
Lord, I lift up my soul: in you, I trust, O my God. Psalms. 25:1-2, and my
children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren are the things I boast about the most.

I am an artist first but I love to write,  whether it is Fiction or Nonfiction. Of course, I get to
illustrate all of my stories. Sometimes when I am deep into telling a tale it feels like I have
stepped into another world and it is a wonderful world of privacy and freedom where I alone am
in control. I truly enjoy writing and painting.