Gary Luvell Forbes Sr.

Gary Luvell Forbes, Sr. was born 24 January 1943 to Alfred Luvell Forbes and Dorothy Genevieve Moore on a sharecropper farm just off highway 11 between Avant and Skiatook where they lived with his older sister, Kay. Wanda, his future wife, would be born the following year just a couple of miles south in another sharecropper cabin.
The family moved by wagon to what would be the Forbes Homestead just across Bird Creek from Avant when Gary was six. Gary grew up on the farm performing all manner of character-building work raising pigs, cattle, and crops. He was one of six young men to graduate for Avant High School in 1961 and he married Wanda Jewell Ridenour that same year. Gary and Wanda had three children, sons Gary Junior and Dusty and daughter Angel. He is survived by his sons, grandson Dusty Jr, granddaughters Christina Allen, Drew Forbes, Skyler Southall, Kassidy Phifer, Montana Stout and Genevieve Forbes, and great grandchildren Isabelle Allen, and Walker and Warren Southall.
Gary enlisted in the United States Army in February 1962 at which time the Forbes family began a twenty-year adventure traveling and living across the United States from Georgia to California, Texas to Rhode Island and states in between. They lived in Germany for three years and ventured all over Europe. Distances were never so great that family didn’t visit, parents, grandparents, brothers and sisters, aunts and uncles, and cousins, they would all come. The Forbes family would return to Oklahoma for holidays and when moving between duty stations.  Their visits would always create excitement in the family, with questions of where you have been, where are you going, what have you seen.  The military was an exciting life but after all travel it was time to go home.
Gary retired from the Army in 1982 and returned to the family homestead.  He and Wanda established Forbes Income Tax and quickly became successful business owners.  When Gary wasn’t preparing taxes, he was running cattle. He and Wanda were big into Simmentals and active in the American Simmental Association with Wanda as it’s treasurer.
Wanda passed away suddenly September 28, 1994, leaving a great void in Gary’s life, a void he tried to lessen but could not. Gary continued to run the tax office and raise cattle, but it was never the same. He had lost his soul mate.
Gary started a new tax business with his son Gary Jr in 2016 and continued preparing taxes up until the last few weeks of his life.  He was always sharp in mind even as his body succumbed to his life injuries from bullets and agent orange, heartbreak, and cancer.  He will be laid to rest beside Wanda and Angel in the family cemetery forever on the farm.
Forbes graduated from Oklahoma State University with a Bachelor of Science degree in Business and is a graduate of the Army Command & General Staff College, and the Navy Command & Staff College. His awards include Silver Star with oak leaf cluster, Bronze Star with third oak leaf cluster, Purple Heart with two oak leaf clusters, Vietnamese Cross of Gallantry (2 awards); Vietnam Service Medal (with 7 service stars); Meritorious Service Medal; Presidential Unit Citation; Meritorious Unit Citation; Combat Infantry Badge; and Parachutist Badge.