Charles Robert Supin

Charles Robert Supin, age 92, died peacefully in Boone, NC, December 21, 2025. Born January 31, 1933, in New York City, Charles (Charlie to his wife, Bob to his family) grew up 4th generation in Brooklyn, playing stickball, singing in the boys’ choir at Manhattan’s Little Church Around the Corner and later studying theater at Adelphi University on Long Island. He satisfied his ROTC commitment as First Lieutenant in the US Marine Corps. Upon returning from his southeast Asian tour of duty (where he began a lifelong fascination with 2 Buddhism), he received his Master of Divinity at Yale’s Berkeley Divinity School and was ordained an Episcopal priest in 1960. 

During seminary, Charles re-connected with Benita (Bonnie) Percik, a friend from college theater; they married December 26, 1959, and began a loving, adventurous partnership lasting sixty-six years. The newlyweds lived in Massapequa, New York where Charles was assistant priest at Grace Episcopal Church, and they had their daughter Jeanne. They soon moved to Lawrence, New York where Charles and Bonnie had their son Robert. Charles served as rector for over a decade at St. John’s Episcopal Church, Far Rockaway.

Charles cultivated an unparalleled depth of knowledge about his two passions: theology and theater. As incongruous as they may seem, both callings informed his life’s ambition to create ethical ways of being in the modern world. He understood both the Christian faith and theater as two among many paths toward empathy, communion, and unconditional love. His sermons could weave together Biblical metaphors, Buddhist tenets, and Shakespearean soliloquies to offer universal guidance for living intentionally and honorably in current times. He led and ministered around racial, religious, and gender integration and equality. He built bridges across generational, economic, and social divides. As leader with the National Council of Churches, he wrote and spoke about church modernization and engagement and hosted a television program highlighting meaningful cultural shifts. (Even decades-after-the-fact, Charles vividly remembered meeting Martin Luther King, Jr., who’s gaze, he said, penetrated his whole being. And turns out, Charles was the first person to interview then-fledgling journalist Gloria Steinem.) 

In 1974, itching for new opportunities, the family moved from New York to Las Vegas, Nevada where Charles served as priest at All Saints Episcopal Church, ministering in a young city poised for explosive diverse growth and developing vacant church property into much-needed housing. Simultaneously, Charles built another career as a Las Vegas theater and entertainment critic for the Las Vegas Review Journal, Los Angeles Herald Examiner and local tv networks. He reviewed countless performances of classic 1970’s and 80’s Vegas headliners, befriending many; he wrote the Muscular Dystrophy Telethon with Jerry Lewis; he hosted tv features about creativity, interviewing entertainers like Don Rickles, Sammy Davis Jr., Joan Rivers, and Liberace; he performed and directed in community theater; and in his 50’s, he completed a Master of Fine Arts in playwriting. He later published the Las Vegas edition of the Los Angeles Herald Examiner and then, gathering partners, purchased and ran Southwest Printers and its publication, the Nifty Nickle. 

Charles and Bonnie retired in 2000 and leapt once again, from Las Vegas to Bald Head Island, NC. Charles served as interim priest at St. Phillips Episcopal Church in Southport, NC and founded a readers’ theater on Bald Head. Five years later, they moved to Jefferson, NC; Charles was interim priest at the Parish of the Holy Communion: Churches of the Frescoes and engaged in the Ashe County theater arts scene, including productions of his own works. Over the decades he amassed a library of over 2000 plays, which he eventually 3 donated to Appalachian State University. At age 87, Charles and Bonnie adventured once more to Boone where they built a new house next to their daughter. 

Throughout his life, Charles practiced the values he preached as equal partner, parent, chore-doer and risk-taker in support of his own, his wife’s, and his children’s multiple graduate degrees and careers. Charles also organized countless excursions -- big and small, near and far -- with the expressed purpose to broaden his family’s horizons, possibilities, and sense of global citizenry. And he made sure his small, tight-knit extended family spent so much time together that across decades, continents, and generations, the family chat still blows up --- sharing joys or sorrows -- every single day. 

Charles loved nothing more than learning about and facilitating his loved ones’ desires, and he will be remembered for his deep intellect, curiosity, and commitment to his family’s wellbeing. He also had really great stories J. Late in life, when pressed by his children, he revealed he was particularly proud of three enduring things: his family, his unquenchable thirst for knowledge, and his ongoing willingness to change his mind and evolve his beliefs. His influence and legacy will extend for generations.

Charles is preceded in death by his parents, Louis Frank Supin and Eleanor Wisdom Evers Supin and brothers-in-law William Robert Fleischhauer and Alan McCulloch. He is survived by his beloved wife, Benita Percik Supin, sister Eleanor Joan McCulloch, daughter Jeanne Leanora Supin, son Robert Wisdom Supin (Kira MacDonald), grandchildren Nicholas Broderick Supin, Lindsey Alec Supin (David Peck), Madeline Teresa Koch (Michael Perkins), great granddaughter Willow Jean Perkins, step grand and great grandsons Alden Taylor Lee and Jase Matthew Peck, nieces Dana Lyn Fleischhauer, Jo Ann Fleischhauer, and Amy Beth Wertheim (William Wertheim) and their children and grandchildren. 

A memorial service will be held Saturday January 3, 2025, at 2:00 pm at St. Mary’s Church, 400 Beaver Creek School Road, West Jefferson, NC. 

In lieu of flowers, please consider contributing to the ACLU, the Ashe County Arts Council, or High Country Caregivers.

Badger Funeral Home & Cremation Services was entrusted with the arrangements for the Supin Family.