John Victor Skiff

J. Victor Skiff was born July 23, 1908, to John Milton Skiff and Winifred E. Hughes, in Gainesville, NY. Victor's Mother, Winifred, died in 1917 at the age of 38. John M. Skiff was the editor of the Gainesville Press, and died of pneumonia following Spanish influenza, in 1918, orphaning Victor at the age of 10. He was then cared for by his uncle, Arthur Garfield Adams, and aunt, Minerva Adams (Skiff). As an adult, at a talk presented to Scouters of the Adirondack Council, he shared that "his boyhood experience in a Scout Troop in Ithaca had developed his interest in the out-or-doors and led to his work in conservation."[1] In 1926, at the age of 18, Victor married Kay Marie Sweeney.

J Victor Skiff competing in the finals of the Eastman Stage Public Speaking Contest, Cornell University, 1928

Vic attended Ithaca Public Schools for 7th and 8th grade, finishing in 1922.

For high school, he attended the world-renowned Starkey Seminary (later renamed Lakemont Academy for Boys[2]), located on Seneca Lake near Watkins Glen, NY, graduating in 1925.

He began his undergraduate studies at Cornell University, in the fall of 1925. In his junior and senior year of college, he qualified for the finals of the 19th and 20th Annual Eastman Stage Contest, respectively, a public speaking contest held in connection with the annual Farm and Home week of the Agricultural College, speaking on the subject "Will History Repeat?" and "Getting Your Money's Worth" as a junior and senior, respectively.[3][4] He graduated with a B.S. from the Agricultural College at Cornell in 1929.

He taught general science for three and a half years, from 1929 to 1932.[5] During this period he was also active with the Boy Scouts. The summer after graduating from Cornell in 1929, he served as head of the Naturalists' Division of Camp Rodney in Maryland.[6] He served as Scoutmaster of Troop No. 46 in Scotia, NY, from the fall of 1929 to the spring of 1930.

J. Victor Skiff was a career man in the New York State Department of Conservation, entering the department as a game research investigator in the Bureau of Game in 1933.[7] He served as a game research investigator until 1937 when the position Assistant Superintendent of Game was created, and he was appointed to it. In 1938 he became Superintendent of Inland Fisheries.[7] In 1941 he served as one of three commissioners from NYS on the Atlantic States Marine Fisheries Compact Commission.[5] In 1941 he also represented the NYS Conservation Department as a New York-Rhode Island Boundary Commissioner.[5] In 1944 he was appointed Deputy Commissioner under the Republican administration of Thomas E. Dewey.[7][8] He served as acting Commissioner after the death of then Commissioner John A. White on December 31, 1944, at age 43[9] until Governor Thomas E. Dewey appointed Perry Duryea as Commissioner in 1945.[10] He was retained as Deputy by the newly appointed Commissioner Perry Duryea.[10] In 1954, when Democrat W. Averell Harriman was elected as governor, Skiff resigned and served as a GOP legislative consultant.[11] In 1959, when Republican Nelson Rockefeller took office as governor, Victor was reappointed as Deputy Commissioner, a position he served in until his untimely death in 1964.[11]

He was a member of the Fort Orange Club. He was one of the first vestrymen at St. David's Church in East Greenbush.

J. Victor Skiff died on September 15, 1964, after suffering a heart attack, at the age of 56.[11]

J Victor Skiff Memorial Golf Course sign, c. 1964

• J. Victor Skiff Memorial Golf Course: a 29 par golf course in Saratoga Spa State Park. A bronze plaque was unveiled by Harold G. Wilm, NYS Conservation Deputy Commissioner, and Vic's son Joseph Skiff in October 1964, naming the course for J Victor Skiff, and ceremonies marking the naming of the course took place in the small course clubhouse.[12] The course is currently named the 29 Par Executive Course.
• On October 3, 1964, the Adirondack Park Association, renamed in 1983 to Adirondack North Country Association (ANCA), recorded a resolution in appreciation for his "...invaluable public service to the people of the State in general and to conservationists and sportsmen in particular..."
• The Spire and Corillon for St. David's Church in East Greenbush were made possible in part through the J. Victor Skiff Memorial Fund.[13]

• "Think Foxes May be to Blame for Scarcity of Birds". Oswego Palladium Times, February 12, 1937, p. 16.
• "Wayne Sportsmen Plan Federation". Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, March 3, 1937, p13.