A Rare [Southern] Bird

“The cabin was quiet..people were in prayer.” –Artimus Pyle

On May 30, 1976, along with Aerosmith, Nazareth and Ted Nugent, Lynyrd Skynyrd played for a very large crowd at RFK Stadium in Washington, D.C.  My brother Kenny was there and 48 years later still has his ticket stub, a collector’s item now.  In those days, there was a great divide between the coiffed polyester-chic disco crowd and the long-haired, bell-bottom wearing Southern rockers like my brother. For them, Ronnie Van Zant and Skynyrd were kindred spirits—they were unapologetically Southern when that was becoming increasingly unfashionable.  At that long ago concert, the fans, mostly from nearby Virginia and Maryland, were waving Battle Flags while on stage Skynyrd played their hits standing, as was their custom, in front of the old banner.  There would come a time, however, when even Skynyrd—or more precisely, a latter-day iteration of the original band—would feel obligated to display the American flag to “temper” their flying the Southern colors should they even decide to do so.  But Ronnie Van Zant would not live to see this.

There are many tales told about Ronnie and his colorful behavior, but he isn’t here to defend himself. He was, no doubt, a mess, but he was also that charismatic and almost preternaturally talented person responsible for the greatest rock band ever—the Rolling Stones didn’t make a patch on their britches in Skynyrd’s glory days.

Van Zant was that rare bird—a real Floridian.  Raised in a rundown neighborhood on the outskirts of Jacksonville when Florida still had a little Dixie left in her, his band gave America new songs of the South to sing.  The “fella with the hair colored yella” had a rebel’s heart and he loved his homeland, warts and all.

Sadly, 47 years ago, he was killed, along with five others, when the chartered plane on which he and band members were traveling to Baton Rouge went down in Amite County, Mississippi.  There is no consensus among the survivors on exactly what happened that October day.  The National Transportation Safety Board ruled that the probable cause of the crash was “fuel exhaustion” related to “crew inattention to fuel supply” and an “engine malfunction of undetermined nature.” Artimus Pyle, one of the band’s drummers and a survivor of the crash, and also a pilot himself, in an interview recalled that as the plane was “gliding” over a wooded area, the landing gear had become entangled with the tops of the trees, pulling the aircraft down. (1) Tragically, a mechanic was to meet them on their arrival in Baton Rouge to check out the old Convair’s condition.  But, of course, they never made it there.

After Ronnie’s death, there were attempts to carry on the Skynyrd tradition.  A tribute band was put together and started touring in the 1980s.  But while Ronnie’s brother Johnny, the lead singer, did a very good job, no one could compare to Ronald Wayne Van Zant.  Years later the band still performs, but this is a very tame version of the original.

Not too long ago I found out that my grandson, who is 21, and my nephew, who is also in his 20s, are LS fans. Skynyrd, however, to these young men with the old Southern rock souls is the 1970s group.  The slick publication Rolling Stone once tediously and predictably contended that LS was always a band with a “complicated” connection to the South. (2) But the real fans young and old of that brainchild of the Southern boy from Shanty Town don’t bother with woke conjecture.  They just turn up the Skynyrd.

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1. Musicians Hall of Fame Backstage Interview with Artimus Pyle, Part III.
2. “Lynyrd Skynyrd: Inside the Band’s Complicated History With the South,” Stephen Thomas Erlewine, Rolling Stone, May 15, 2018.

J.L. Bennett

J.L. Bennett is an independent historian living in Virginia and the author of Maryland, My Maryland: The Cultural Cleansing of a Small Southern State.

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