Harold R. “Hal” Skinner, 78, died of a heart attack on June 1 while he was tending his horses.

Hal always joked he was born a hundred years late. A 39-year
Sonoma County resident, Hal strove to keep the 21st – and 20th –
centuries at bay as he pursued his many passions that included
raising and training Belgian draft horses, artist blacksmithing,
local history and collecting and restoring horse-drawn
vehicles.
He was born in Richmond, IN in 1925, and began his lifelong love
of horses with his first pony at age 4. His only time without a
horse occurred while in the service during World War II.
His wife of 67 years, Lorna, recalled, “Hal rode onto the
Earlham College campus [in Richmond] with his friend and courted me
on horseback from under my dormitory window.” When he moved his
family to California in 1965, “Western Horseman” magazine recounted
their adventures as they brought their two horses across the
country.
Hal was a high school basketball star in a tiny school barely
bigger than a regulation team. Eager to serve his country and to
learn to fly, 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 never saw action, but gained plenty of flying time
over Texas.
He entered Earlham College following discharge, married Lorna
Pownall in 1947, started a family, and graduated with a degree in
English in 1948. Inspired by writer and agrarian reformer Louis
Bromfield – the Wendell Berry of his day – 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 for the Richmond
Palladium-Item before returning to school to pursue a Ph.D. in
communication at Indiana University. His degree led him in 1965 to
Sonoma State University, where he served as the first director of
the audio-visual department. He retired in 1988 as a professor of
education after many years of supervising student teachers in
classrooms across West County.
Hal thrived in retirement. Although he never again had his
diversified farm, his organic apple orchard became his 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 two-ton horses through voice
commands alone.
“He could tame anything,” his wife said. He was active with the
North Coast Draft Horse and Mule Association, and 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 four-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 keychains to an authentic replica of a
massive chandelier hanging in the Yellowstone National Park Lodge.
In his successful guise as an old-time blacksmith, he entertained
crowds at the Gravenstein Apple Fair, the Bale Grist Mill’s Pioneer
Days, and many other venues. While he was proud of his education,
he was immensely pleased when visitors believed he had stood at his
anvil all his life.
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 was a saxophonist who played with the Community Church
of Sebastopol’s wind band and the Fourth of July Band with his son,
Geoffrey Skinner, daughter, Kathi Jacobs, and son-in-law, Greg
Jacobs. He loved the outdoors and backpacked throughout the
mountains of California with his family, including long trips in
the High Sierras for milestone birthdays.
“I discovered archaeology after finding arrowheads with him in
Indiana,” said his daughter, Betsy Skinner-Ainsworth, and his son,
Geoffrey, remembered, “He encouraged my love of backpacking even
when he grumbled about the incredibly rugged country we hiked
through.”
In addition to his wife and children, Hal leaves his
grandchildren, Jennifer and Lindsey Jacobs, and Galen
Schwan-Skinner.
A celebration of Hal’s life takes place at 4 p.m. on June 19 at
the Community Church of Sebastopol, 1000 Gravenstein Hwy. N,
Sebastopol, with an additional celebration planned for later in the
summer at the Burbank Experiment Farm.
Donations in his name may be made to Western Sonoma County
Historical Society, 261 South Main St., Sebastopol, 95472.