William Pailin Skinner Jr.

Business North Carolina

By: Linda C. Ray

William Pailin Skinner, Jr. was born July 31, 1929 in the Skinner family home in Elizabeth City. Having babies was not discussed in those days so his three older siblings were surprised to find a baby brother when they returned home from camp that year. During his childhood, he did get a taste of the mountains when he attended Camp Sequoyah but his great love was always the beach. His father built a cottage at Nags Head in 1933 when the only way to reach the Outer Banks was by ferry. The Skinner family spent entire summers there from Memorial Day to Labor Day. Bill now owns the cottage and has maintained it almost in the same condition as when it was built but with the addition of electricity and hot water.

Bill attended school in Elizabeth City, worked his way up through Boy Scout activities to become an Eagle Scout, and sang in the choir at Christ Episcopal Church. He was elected president of the student body at Elizabeth City High School in eleventh grade, the final year of high school available at that time. The twelfth grade was added the year he would have gone, but his father was afraid it would be a repeat of the eleventh and sent him to Virginia Episcopal School for his last year of high school. Bill credits VES with teaching him how to study so he could go on to be a successful student at Chapel Hill, participate in the NROTC program and enjoy fraternity life as a member of Zeta Psi. At Chapel Hill, he earned both his degree and a commission as ensign in the United States Naval Reserve. After graduation he went on active duty during the “Korean Police Action,” serving in the Mediterranean and Caribbean. He particularly enjoyed his deployment to Italy where he turned an interest in opera into a lifetime passion after hearing the young Renata Tebaldi sing years before she became known in the United States.

By 1953, Bill was back at Chapel Hill in Law School. He studied hard and worked on the Law Review for his last two years. It was during this time at law school that he met Harriet Morgan, a journalism student. They were married several days after learning he had passed the North Carolina bar exam and moved to Norfolk where Bill worked for the National Bank of Commerce. Much as he liked Virginia, Bill’s heart always belonged to North Carolina so he jumped at the chance to join Charles Fulton and Howard Manning to practice law in Raleigh. Bill and Harriett had a happy 46 years of marriage and two wonderful children, William P. Skinner III and Harriet McLeod Skinner. Two years after Harriett’s death in 2003, he married Jennette Campbell Herbert whom he had known as a friend for over 30 years.