George Skinner

As a youngster George Skinner worked in the family firm of Lilley and Skinner, the well-known boot and shoe manufacturers. Around 1895, following a visit to the United States, he was one of the first people to introduce modern shoe-making equipment into Britain. However, Skinner’s first love was not shoes but motoring, and from the time he first drove on the Continent in 1898, he was never without a car.

Skinner took an interest in, and was engaged in, the early development of the petrol engine and in the early-1900s he invented the S.U. Carburettor, which became widely used in most vehicles in Great Britain after World War I. Skinner was one of the founders and vice-presidents of the Institute of Patentees, and was well known within the City of London as a warden of the Cordwainer’s Company, for which he became a Freeman of the City of London.

A fine clay bird shot, Skinner was a member of the Ealing Gun Club and was in the Great Britain II squad that won the trap bronze medal at the 1908 London Olympics. Skinner was also a keen yachtsman and accomplished golfer, and was a member of the West Middlesex Golf Club.