C Brightman Skinner

In 2000, Arthur Chester Jr., Charles Brightman Skinner and Mary Virginia Skinner Jones sold 207 acres of land to Ben Carter Properties to develop the St. Johns Town Center. Family members still own 1,200 acres around the Town Center. (in Jacksonville Florida) In 1992, the family donated an additional 288 acres adjacent to the campus, providing the University of North Florida land for continued growth. The story of the Skinner family in the area dates to the 1890s, when Richard Green Skinner settled in Jacksonville and accumulated around 16,000 acres of land in southeast Duval County to use for logging and turpentine production. After their father’s death, Richard Skinner’s seven sons managed the family land and business through the Great Depression while expanding their holdings. One of those sons, A. Chester Skinner, eventually gave his portion of land to his three children; Arthur Chester Jr., Charles Brightman Skinner and Mary Virginia Skinner Jones. It was this land that the A. C. Skinner family used to facilitate the growth of Jacksonville through strategic donations of their land for the construction of J. Turner Butler Boulevard, Southside Boulevard and Interstate 295. It was also this land, along with adjacent land owned by Alexander Brest and George Hodges, Sr., that was offered in 1968 to the selection committee charged with locating Florida’s newest university and on which UNF now resides.