Patricia O. Skinner, a former registered nurse and homemaker who enjoyed sailing, died Friday from complications of an infection at Greater Baltimore Medical Center.

The longtime Mays Chapel resident was 79.

The daughter of Harold N. O’Connor and Marie D. O’Connor, the former Patricia O’Connor was born in Baltimore and raised in Hereford where she graduated from Hereford High School.

While a nursing student at the Mercy Hospital School of Nursing, she met her future husband, M. Edward Skinner III, who was in the hospital recovering from a tonsillectomy.

“When he wanted to know her name she originally gave him a fake name,” said her daughter, Melinda “Mindy” Skinner Littel of Arnold, said with a laugh.

Mrs. Skinner obtained her nursing degree in 1959 — the same year she married Mr. Skinner, who worked for Consolidated Engineering Co.

The couple initially settled in Rodgers Forge. In 1967 they moved to Mays Chapel into a house they designed and built themselves.

Mrs. Skinner continued her nursing career at what is now Mercy Medical Center until she had her son in 1962.

She and her husband were members of the Annapolis Yacht Club and owned two ocean racing yachts, a Peterson 43 and a Tartan 41. In addition to sailing the Chesapeake Bay, they competed in a 1978 yacht race from Newport, R.I., to Bermuda aboard the Tartan 41.

From the 1970s into the late 1980s, the couple owned and operated Bates Marine Basin in Oxford.

An avid duckpin bowler, Mrs. Skinner was president of the St. Joseph’s Bowling League in Cockeysville and was active in the mixed bowling league at the Baltimore Country Club, where she and her husband were members.

She volunteered with Pets on Wheels with her dog, Raven, and enjoyed visiting residents of Pickersgill Retirement Community in West Towson. She was also a member of the Woman’s Club of Roland Park.

A private graveside service will be held Thursday.

In addition to her husband and daughter, Mrs. Skinner is survived by a son, M. Edward Skinner IV of Falls Church, Va.; and four grandchildren.

—Frederick N. Rasmussen