James Lister Skinner Iii

Dateline – Clinton, SC
Dr. James Lister Skinner III of Clinton, SC passed away on Tuesday, December 27, 2016 at the Laurens County (SC) Hospital from complications of Alzheimer ’s disease. His well-lived life of the mind, body, and spirit stands as a legacy of learning and of love.
Jim was born on September 24, 1938 at Emory University Hospital just outside Atlanta. He was the first of the four sons of James L. Skinner, Jr. and Josephine Norvell Fry Skinner. His father was called to service in the Pacific days after Pearl Harbor, making Jim as he put it ‘a child of WWII’ – with formative years subject to frequent relocation and the constant fear of traumatic loss. He found stability post-war with a move to Azalea Circle in the suburb of North Decatur and Clairmont Presbyterian Church.
Jim was a 140-pound star fullback for the Druid Hills Red Devils, the senior class president, and was compared by high school classmates to James Dean-- though he was never wont to express any particular affection for 1950s culture. A love of military discipline led him to North Georgia College in Dahlonega, GA, where he met his wife, Ramona Ann York-- first seeing her across a crowded cafeteria and then remarking to the friend next to him: “I’m going to marry that girl.” Another lifelong love began with exposure to literature and poetry, blossoming while attending a production of Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night.
Jim earned a BA of English in 1960 and he and Ramona were married in 1961, the year of her graduation. Inspired by a North Georgia English professor (C.J. Dismukes), Jim then took a National Defense Fellowship and went on to earn both his Masters (1962) and PhD (1965) in English from the University of Arkansas. While there in Fayetteville Jim and Ramona came to know their lifelong best friends John and Marge Idol. Jim and Ramona then moved to Mt. Clemens, Michigan, where he served as an artillery commander at Selfridge Air Force Base, and where the couple survived a tornado that passed over their home.
In 1965 Dr. Skinner eagerly accepted the offer of an appointment to become a Professor of English at Presbyterian College (PC), having been inspired by the college’s motto: Dum Vivimus Servimus (“While We Live, We Serve.”) After extensive summer travels throughout Europe with the Idols, Jim and Ramona began a family in 1970-- with the birth of their one child and Jim’s namesake. Fatherhood for Jim involved the commitments of playing Nerf basketball in the hallway with his son after a long day of classes, then reading The Iliad to him as a bedtime story.
A passionate focus on teaching kept Dr. Skinner at PC for his entire career (38 years). He treasured his students as much as anything in his life—reaching out to them always with knowledge and often in empathy –drawing from them and their achievements the very foundation of his sense of self-worth and fulfillment. He was awarded the PC Alumni Teaching Award in 1972, was named both the State and Governor’s Professor of the Year in 1991, and served as the Charles A. Dana Professor of English for more than a decade at the end of his career.
Jim dubbed by many a “Renaissance man.” His teaching career was shaped by and often directly incorporated interests in drama and history. He also was intrigued by the topic of media and concerned about its influence on society, and served as the first Director of PC’s Russell Program. As for drama, he continued acting as he had in college—a favorite role was “The Old Shakespearian Actor” in the musical The Fantasticks. History “became now” for him with the Skinner family’s inheritance and preservation of Roswell’s Archibald Smith Plantation Home. There was discovered the source material for three books that Skinner would edit: The Autobiography of Henry Merrell (1991); The Death of a Confederate, with Arthur Skinner (1996), and The Refugees (2004). Skinner also researched and authored the story of a Newberry (SC) orphanage, Boys Farm, published in 2002.
Retiring from PC in 2003, Dr. Skinner was elected to North Georgia College and State University’s Hall of Fame in 2004. But he was all too soon overtaken by a disease that ravaged that life of the mind and body, but never killed his spirit, sense of duty, and love for his wife Ramona.
Jim Skinner hated “the wave” at baseball games, Elvis Presley, cats, any adjective used with the word unique, misuses of the words good, well, and quote, the unfettered rise of the personal computer, and above all: the slightest willful acceptance of (and God forbid any reverence for) ignorance of any kind. These dislikes paled next to his deep loves of the Victorian era, Charles Dickens, the British Museum, Faulkner’s Yoknapatawpha, the Gullah Geechee dialect and culture, etymology, Mozart, Bill Monroe and the Carter family, the Atlanta Crackers at Ponce De Leon Park, the Atlanta Braves, Palladian architecture, single malt scotch, and the steam-powered locomotive.
Jim Skinner is survived by his wife Ramona of Clinton, SC; son, James Lister Skinner IV of Decatur, GA (Sarah); granddaughter, Eleanor Josephine Skinner; brother, Rev. William Wirt Skinner of Canton, NC (Torpy); brother, Thomas Fry Skinner of Charlotte, NC (Linda); brother, Arthur Norvell Skinner of St. Petersburg, FL (Katrina); and nine nieces and nephews with their children.
A memorial service will be held at First Presbyterian Church of Clinton, SC, on Friday, January 6 at 2:00pm. Live streaming of the service will be available at http://www.fpcclinton.org/ . A graveside service, followed by internment will occur at Mountain View Park Cemetery in Marietta, GA, on Saturday, January 7 at 2:00pm.
In lieu of flowers, the family requests that donations in Dr. Skinner’s memory be made to the Alzheimer’s Association http://www.alz.org/ or to another charity of the contributor’s choice. Remembrances may be sent to the family in care of his son Jimmy Skinner at jsresearch@hotmail.com , or to his wife Ramona Skinner at 801 Musgrove St, Clinton, SC 29325.
We were students of Dr. Skinner throughout a life during which the teacher was always learning. Now with the darkness of his disease lifted, we should “remember him in light”—on the classroom stage---illuminating the truths of great literature, revealing its lessons about life.
Condolences may be expressed online at www.grayfuneralhome.com
Gray Funeral Home of Clinton