PORT ANGELES — A memorial service is planned today for Dorothy Maybelle Skerbeck, a pioneering advocate for the developmentally disabled in Port Angeles, who died at her home last Friday.
Skerbeck was 93. She died of coronary artery disease.
A memorial service will be held at 11 a.m. today at Queen of Angels Catholic Church, 209 W. 11th St., Port Angeles.
Skerbeck was remembered by family and friends as a caring visionary who helped build a support network for people with developmental disabilities.
Motivated by a lack of available services for her 12th child, who was born with Down syndrome in 1961, Skerbeck shepherded programs to help educate, house and provide jobs for those with special needs.
She became local president of the state Association for Retarded Citizens, as it was then called, and helped raise funds for a group home for developmentally disabled adults.
Skerbeck was among the parents who launched the Clallam County Day Training preschool, which became the First Step Family Support Center.
In 1969, Skerbeck co-founded the nonprofit Clallam County Hostelries Individualized Support Services, which supports adults with developmental disabilities to this day.
Michael Soiseth, CCH Individualized Support Services director, described Skerbeck as “energetic,” “compassionate” and “progressive.”
“Dorothy was just always an advocate for people with developmental disabilities being included in the community and trying to do away with the stigma of housing large numbers of similar people in institutions,” Soiseth said.
“She was just a real unique woman.”
Skerbeck received a Clallam County Community Service Award in 1999 for her activism, particularly in the 1960s and ’70s.
“The fact that there are now services on the Peninsula is completely different than when my brother was born,” said Bobbie Baldwin, Skerbeck’s fourth daughter.
“There are so many services now.”
Despite professional advice at the time, Skerbeck and her late husband, Dr. Frank Skerbeck, never gave a second thought to sending their son to a large, state-run institution, Baldwin said.
Their 12th child, Thomas Skerbeck of Port Angeles, is now working at Pacific Office Equipment and living in one of the facilities under the CCH Individualized Support Services umbrella.
“I know my brother is so well taken care of,” Baldwin said.
Baldwin said her mother had a “joy of living in the outdoors, living healthy in the outdoors, and enjoying what we have on the Peninsula.”
An avid skier, backpacker and mountain climber, Skerbeck remained physically active well into her later years.
She rode her bicycle several miles to attend Kiwanis meetings in her 70s, Baldwin said.
Born in Webster, Wis., in May 1923, Skerbeck earned a teaching degree when she was just 19, according to biographical information provided by her eldest daughter, Kathleen Beil.
A second-generation Polish immigrant, Skerbeck taught English to students who were nearly her age during World War II.
“It was really important to her that her English was correct,” Baldwin said.
Dorothy married Frank Skerbeck, then a medical student, in December 1944. The couple moved around the country after Frank served in the Army and Dorothy earned a bachelor’s degree in biology.
Frank dreamed of living near the Olympic Mountains when he was finishing his residency in Seattle, Skerbeck recalled in a 2013 interview with the Peninsula Daily News.
The couple had moved to Port Angeles to raise a family on a 20-acre farm by the mid-1950s.
They raised 15 children: Kathleen, Sharron, Marilyn, Bobbie, Patricia, Carole, Franz, Leon, Terese, Ben, Matthew, Thomas, Damian, Andy and Eric, their adopted son.
All of the children were graduates of Queen of Angels Catholic School.
“It was important to be educated, have a good vocabulary, use proper grammar and diction and exhibit good manners,” according to Beil’s notes.
“Mother taught table etiquette that we learned and obeyed. You didn’t want to be the one caught talking with food in your mouth or reaching across the table for something.”
A practical Dorothy Skerbeck earned a pilot’s license after the couple purchased a small airplane “in case something happened to Frank midair,” Beil said.
“She described herself as frightened, but she met the challenge of learning to fly and succeeded.”
Frank Skerbeck died of cancer in 1996.
Dorothy continued to work on behalf of those with special needs as one of two or three “big mainstays” on the Clallam County Developmental Disabilities Advisory Committee during much of the past decade, said Tim Bruce, county Health and Human Service planner.
“She was a strong advocate and just a really great lady, and really caring,” Bruce said.
“She was one of the leaders on the board for a long time.”
Upon receiving the Clallam County Community Service Award in 1999, an “honored” Skerbeck credited other volunteers for helping the cause.
“They did it,” Skerbeck told the PDN in March 1999, “and things came to be that hadn’t been before.”
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Reporter Rob Ollikainen can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 56450, or at rollikainen@peninsula dailynews.com.
Dorothy Skerbeck in an undated family photo.
