Benjamin F.(Franklin) Skinner was born in about 1814 in Virgina. He married Mary Ann Goddard in Tennessee. He died in Texas in 1896. No one seems to know who his parents were, though he listed in an 1880 census that his parents were both born in Kentucky, but that he was born in Virginia.

Details that I do know from family history is that Benjamin and Mary Ann moved from Tennessee to Arkansas, from Arkansas to Des Moines, Iowa, and then back to Arkansas briefly before heading for Texas.

He died in Bartlett, Texas in 1896.

From records that I have, I know he was a farmer, and itinerant Methodist preacher.