For a woman who’s traveled to Antarctica and shaken hands with First Lady Nancy Reagan at the White House, Margaret Vason Foerster is awfully humble about her life story.
“I’m just not that interesting,” she insisted as she sat at her kitchen island, a wall full of photos behind her suggesting quite the contrary.
Margaret was born in Tallahassee and moved to Jacksonville’s Southside when she was six years old. She has fond memories of San Marco from the ‘40s and ‘50s – she and her friends pulled a wagon and collected bottles to return for the cash deposit. Often, that money was spent at the San Marco Theatre.
As Margaret tells it, there were less drugs and alcohol in those days, but there was trouble of a different sort: Elvis Presley. When The King came to town in 1956 for a provocative series of performances at the Florida Theatre, Margaret was right there, starstruck in the third row. Nearly 70 years later, she sat in the same row with her daughters and granddaughters for an Elvis tribute concert. She’s also been on an Elvis cruise and has a small collection of Elvis mugs.
Margaret attended Landon High School, graduating in 1959, and went on to Florida State University, where she got her B.S. in education. She got her master’s taking night courses at Jacksonville University and became an elementary school teacher, teaching first at Holiday Hill and then at Ortega Elementary.
Her next job was with ITV Public Television, producing an educational program about Jacksonville history for school children called “Your Town and Mine.” That’s how 27-year-old Margaret found herself in a plane over the skies of Duval County recording aerial footage for the show. Her boss, Bill Galbraith, would frequently tell her, “You can do anything.” Margaret took that advice to heart.
Margaret went on to teach at Episcopal School of Jacksonville’s St. Mark’s campus before retiring from teaching, but her passion for history and genealogy would continue long after her days in the classroom were over. She eventually became president of the local chapter of the Colonial Dames, discovering she shared an ancestor with George Washington and even traveling to Bologna, Italy to explore her heritage and meet Italian relatives she never knew she had.
One day in her early 30s, now divorced and a mother of two, Margaret received a call “out of the blue” from local attorney David Foerster, better known as “Dink” by those who loved him most. Dink had served in World War II as a naval aviator, searching for German submarines in the North Atlantic by night with his squadron. After the war, he took his skills as a pilot and became a hurricane hunter, a profession that was then still in its infancy. He was calling to ask Margaret out on a date. When Dink came by to pick Margaret up, the babysitter mouthed to her, “He’s the one!” She turned out to be right.
In the spring of 1974, Dink asked Margaret what her plans for that summer were, to which she replied, “Traveling.” When she asked him what his summer plans were, he responded, “I’m going to marry you this summer.” A few months later, they were married.
“Dink was always so supportive of me, encouraging me in everything I did, ” Margaret said.
Margaret and Dink had five children – two of Margaret’s, two of Dink’s, and one together. They made the most of their nearly 50 years of marriage, traveling the globe and visiting all seven continents. Dink never let his age diminish his adventurous spirit, skydiving at the age of 81. He passed away in 2021 at the age of 98. As a speaker at his funeral put it, Dink and Margaret not only traveled the world together, they were each other’s world.
Margaret has continued to stay busy, tutoring at Ortega Elementary and teaching Bible school at St. Mark’s. She is proud of her large, tight-knit family – five children, six grandchildren, and six great-grandchildren. And she misses Dink, whom she still calls her “prince,” every day.
