Known affectionately as “The Chief”, Hespeler industrialist George Duthie Forbes was the son of Robert Forbes and Ann Duthie. He was born on a farm near Morriston Ontario in the township of Badenoch in 1860. He began to learn the textile trade in 1880 when he went to work in the worsted department of the Farr Alpaca plant in Holyoke Massachusetts. He returned to Hespeler in January 1882 and went to work in the family business the R. Forbes Co. Ltd. He became the company president in 1888. When his father died a few years later in 1895, George Forbes assumed full responsibility for the operations of the company. He led the company until 1928 when it was sold to Dominion Woollens and Worsteds Co. Ltd.
In addition to his interests in the R. Forbes Co., Mr Forbes was a director of Royal Trust Co.; the Lake Erie and Northern Railway; the Waterloo Trust and Savings Co. and the Hespeler Furniture Co. He was president of the C. Turnbull Co. of Galt; the Taylor-Forbes Co. of Guelph; the Guelph and Ontario Investment and Savings Society; the Guelph Trust Co. and Simplicity Products Ltd. of Hespeler. He was also the vice-president of the Canada Machinery Corporation of Galt, Galt Malleable Iron and the Dominion Life Assurance Co. of Waterloo.
He was also associated with the Kondu Co. of Preston and the Stamped and Enamelled Ware Co. of Hespeler. Mr Forbes was the first elected Mayor of the incorporated Town of Hespeler holding the office from 1901 to 1913. He was the president of the 1926 Hespeler Homecoming, was a consistent and generous supporter of Freeport Sanatorium, was active with the Red Cross and the Patriotic Society during World War I and, in 1915, donated Forbes Park in downtown Hespeler to the town. He died at his home in Hespeler on 27 Sep 1934 and is buried in New Hope Cemetery.
