Harold R. (Hal) Skinner, 1925-2004
First Director of Audio-Visual Services at SSU

Submitted by Geoffrey Skinner, Technical Services Librarian and
Technical Services Coordinator, SSU University Library

Hal Skinner, Professor Emeritus, always joked he was born a hundred years late. Despite his chosen profession and efforts to teach the use of modern media technology while at SSU, he strove to keep the 21st - and 20th - centuries at bay elsewhere.

He pursued his many passions that included raising and training Belgian draft horses, artist blacksmithing, local history, and collecting and restoring horse-drawn vehicles. A heart attack felled him on June 1 as he was tending his beloved team of Belgians. He was 78.

Hal's stay on campus began with a ten-minute airport interview for the first Director of Audio-Visual Services in 1965 when SSU was still Sonoma State College and located in temporary quarters in downtown Rohnert Park.

He moved his family and two horses across the country from Indiana to California and they soon settled in Sebastopol, where he lived the rest of his life. Hal was a well-known presence on campus from the time he arrived in 1965 until his retirement in 1988.

Hal enjoyed directing the Audio-Visual Department. and its staff, including Phil Peterson, Andy Anderson, Don Cabrall and Mark Anderson, as it grew with the college and later became the Instructional Resources Center. In addition to his regular duties, he taught extension classes in media technology for teachers in Sonoma and southern Mendocino counties.

Like many, he clashed with President Peter Diamandopoulus and as a result, moved to the School of Education where he taught for the rest of his career. During his time in Education, he conducted seminars in a variety of subjects and supervised student teachers throughout west Sonoma County. His environmental education seminar was always popular and his personal favorite.

Born in Richmond, Ind., in 1925, Hal was a high school basketball star in a tiny school barely bigger than a regulation team. He was eager to serve his country and to learn to fly, so he enlisted in the Army Air Corps in 1943. His discharge as a 2nd Lt. in the Army Air Force came on Pearl Harbor Day in 1945.

He graduated from Earlham College in Richmond with a degree in English after marrying Lorna Pownall in 1947 and starting a family. Inspired by writer and agrarian reformer Louis Bromfield, Hal struggled to live his dream of operating a diversified farm, which he had to finance by teaching high school English and history. He also worked as a carpenter and a newspaper journalist before returning to school to pursue the doctorate in education at Indiana University that eventually led him to SSU.

Hal thrived in retirement. His organic apple orchard became a refuge in which he could realize his dream of training draft horses. He believed in gentling, rather than breaking, and proudly demonstrated his ability to direct the 2-ton horses through voice commands alone. At the time of his death, he was training his newest horse to complete a team for pulling his newly restored circus bandwagon in a 4-horse hitch.

He also developed his blacksmithing skills from dabbler to master level. He produced a wide variety of decorative ironwork, ranging from wizard's head key chains to an authentic replica of a massive chandelier hanging in the Yellowstone National Park Lodge. In his successful guise as an old-timey blacksmith, he entertained crowds at the Gravenstein Apple Fair, the Bale Grist Mill, and many other venues.

Hal was active in the Western Sonoma County Historical Society and was instrumental in restoring Luther Burbank's cottage and reviving the remaining Burbank-developed plants at the Burbank Experiment Farm in Sebastopol. He also worked to preserve local history through volunteering at Sturgeon's Sawmill near Occidental.

He cultivated wide-ranging literary and musical tastes. Hal had no use for television, computers, and many other modern gadgets, but he always kept current through reading newspapers and magazines, as well as nearly four decades of twice-monthly discussion group meetings. He inspired his family with his love of the outdoors and backpacked extensively, including long trips in the High Sierras for milestone birthdays.

In addition to his wife, Hal leaves his children, Kathi Jacobs, Betsy Skinner-Ainsworth and Geoffrey Skinner and grandchildren, Jennifer and Lindsey Jacobs, and Galen Schwan-Skinner.

Donations in his name may be made to Western Sonoma County Historical Society (WSCHS), 261 S Main, Sebastopol, 95472.

ABOVE - Hal Skinner at his forge where he often worked like an old-time blacksmith. (Skinner Family Photo)