R.I.P. Leonard Skinner: A Simple Kind of Man

Retired high school gym coach Leonard Skinner passed away this week at the age of 77.

Normally, the passing of a physical education teacher, while poignant, would not be grist for the Rock Turtleneck mill. But Mr. Skinner was the gym coach at Robert E. Lee High in Jacksonville, FL, where, in the early 1970s, he enforced a strict dress code on a long-haired guitarist named Gary Rossington, and subsequently had him suspended.

As revenge, Rossington's singer and bandleader Ronnie Van Zandt appropriated a twisted version of Skinner's name and thus Lynyrd Skynyrd was born. (You can read a nice column about Skinner from the Orlando Sentinel here.)

Had I been in a rock band named after a cruel misspelling of my high school gym coach's name, that band might have been called Dugg Roobyn.

Lynyrd (pronounced "Leh-Nerd" not "Linnerd") Skynyrd is by far my favorite southern rock band. (For whatever reason, I've never been able to get into the Allmans.) They took the southern boogie genre and infused it with a grandeur, wit and sense of fun that raised it to art.

For all the notoriety Skinner attained upon Skynyrd's success, he never let it get to his head. Sounds to me like he was a simple kind of man.

So let's pay tribute with my favorite Skynyrd tune "Simple Man," from their first album Pronounced Leh-Nerd Skin-Nerd and the sadly out-of-print 2-LP Gold & Platinum collection, where I first heard the tune as a simple teen.


R.I.P. Coach Skinner. You're as free as a bird now.


Buy Pronounced Leh-Nerd Skin-Nerd on iTunes here