ALLEN COLLINS SMOKING A JOINT AT REHEARSAL PHOTO I TOOK * LYNYRD SKYNYRD

Description

.
UP FOR AUCTION IS this *
I took this photo of
Allen Collins smoking a joint at the Lynyrd Skynyrd studio on Riverside Ave. in Jacksonville Florida with R
onnie VanZant also also in the photo make a gesture like he is saying something to Allen .
* 7 1/2  X  8 3/4 inch *
* From Craig Reed's 40 Year Roadie LYNYRD SKYNYRD Survivor Collection *
Allen Collins
Background information
Birth name
Larkin Allen Collins, Jr.
Born
July 19, 1952
Jacksonville, Florida
, U.S.
Died
January 23, 1990 (aged 37)
Jacksonville, Florida, U.S.
Genres
Southern rock
Occupation(s)
Musician, songwriter
Instruments
Guitar
Years active
1964–1986
Associated acts
Lynyrd Skynyrd
,
The Rossington-Collins Band
,
The Allen Collins Band
Larkin Allen Collins Jr.
[1]
[2]
(July 19, 1952 – January 23, 1990) was one of the founding members and guitarists of
Southern rock
band
Lynyrd Skynyrd
, and co-wrote many of the band's songs with late frontman
Ronnie Van Zant
. He was born in
Jacksonville, Florida
.
Contents
1
Personal life
2
Musical career
3
Accident, band reunions and death
4
Instruments
5
Discography
6
References
7
Further reading
8
External links
Personal life
Collins started playing guitar at 12 years of age, with a few lessons from his stepmother, Leila Collins, a country-and-western guitarist, teaching him a few notes, and receiving his first guitar and amplifier from his father after a falling-out between the two. Collins attended
Nathan B. Forrest High School
.
[3]
In 1970, Collins married Kathy Johns. All of his bandmates were in his wedding party, but Kathy worried that the band's long haired appearance would disturb her parents. To solve this problem, she required all the band members to keep their hair under wigs at the wedding ceremony. The wedding reception was one of the first public performances of "
Free Bird
" complete with the trademark extended guitar jam at the end. Collins's family grew with the birth of his daughter Amie, followed quickly by Allison.
Musical career
Allen Collins joined Skynyrd in Jacksonville, Florida, just two weeks after its formation by
Ronnie Van Zant
and
Gary Rossington
, along with
Bob Burns
and
Larry Junstrom
. Knowing that Collins played guitar and owned his own equipment, the band decided to approach him about joining them. Van Zant and Burns both had a reputation for trouble, and Collins fled on his bicycle and hid up a tree when he saw them pull up in his driveway. They soon convinced him that they were not there to beat him up and he agreed to join the band, then known as The One Percent.
[4]
Collins and lead singer Ronnie Van Zant co-wrote many of the biggest Skynyrd hits, including "
Free Bird
", "
Gimme Three Steps
", and "
That Smell
". The band received national success beginning in 1973 while opening for
The Who
on their
Quadrophenia
tour.
On October 20, 1977, an airplane carrying the band
crashed into a forest in Mississippi
, killing three band members, including Van Zant. Collins was seriously injured in the crash, suffering two broken vertebrae in his neck and severe damage to his right arm. While amputation was recommended, Collins' father refused and he eventually recovered.
During the early 1980s, Collins continued to perform on stage in
The Rossington-Collins Band
which enjoyed modest success, releasing two albums (
Anytime, Anyplace, Anywhere
, and
This Is the Way
), and charting a few singles (notably "Don't Misunderstand Me").
Tragedy struck again just as the Rossington Collins Band was getting off the ground. In 1980, during the first days of the debut concert tour, Collins's wife, Kathy, suddenly died of a hemorrhage during the miscarriage of their third child. This forced the tour's cancellation. With the lingering effects of losing his friends in the plane crash, Kathy's death devastated Collins.
The Rossington-Collins Band disbanded in 1982. Collins continued to pursue music, starting the
Allen Collins Band
, which released one album,
Here, There & Back
in 1983. The six members were Skynyrd keyboardist
Billy Powell
and bassist
Leon Wilkeson
, along with lead singer Jimmy Dougherty, drummer Derek Hess, and guitarists Barry Lee Harwood and Randall Hall. In 1984, Collins tried to resurrect the band, hiring Jacksonville guitarist Mike Owings and bassist Andy Ward King. Later members included guitarist-vocalist Michael Ray FitzGerald and bassist "Filthy Phil" Price. In 1986, Collins crashed his Ford Thunderbird into a ditch, killing his girlfriend and paralyzing himself.
In 1987, Collins and his manager-father decided to reform Lynyrd Skynyrd and began recruiting former Lynyrd Skynyrd members.
Accident, band reunions and death
On January 29, 1986,
[5]
Collins was driving a new black Ford Thunderbird when he was involved in a car accident that claimed the life of his girlfriend, Debra Jean Watts, and
paralyzed
the guitarist from the waist down, with limited use of his arms and hands. Collins pleaded
no contest
to
vehicular manslaughter
as well as driving under the influence of alcohol. He would never play guitar on stage again.
Collins' last performance with Lynyrd Skynyrd was at the band's first reunion after the plane crash at the 1979 Volunteer Jam V in Nashville, Tennessee. All remaining members of Lynyrd Skynyrd reunited officially in 1987, but due to his injury, Collins only served as musical director.
[6]
[
citation needed
]
As part of his plea bargain for the 1986 accident, Collins addressed fans at every Skynyrd concert with an explanation of why he could not perform, citing the dangers of drinking and driving, as well as drugs and alcohol.
[
citation needed
]
Also because of Collins' accident, the band donated a sizable amount of concert proceeds from the 1987–88 tour to the
Miami Project
, which is involved in treatment of paralysis.
[
citation needed
]
Collins founded Roll For Rock Wheelchair Events and Benefit Concerts in 1988 to raise awareness and to provide opportunities for those living with spinal cord injuries and other physical challenges.
Allen Collins died on January 23, 1990 from chronic pneumonia, a complication of the paralysis. He is buried beside his wife in Jacksonville, Florida.
In 2006, Collins was posthumously inducted into the
Rock and Roll Hall of Fame
as a member of Lynyrd Skynyrd.
Instruments
In the early days of Lynyrd Skynyrd, Collins used a black
Gibson Flying V
. However, after a gig the band's van was broken into and the guitar, along with Gary Rossington's white
Gibson SG
, was stolen. For most of his tenure in Skynyrd, Collins used a
Gibson Firebird
guitar fitted with a chrome, dog-eared
P-90
pickup in the bridge position and a Gibson "teaspoon" nickel vibrato arm. In 1976, he switched to a natural-finished
korina
1958
Gibson Explorer
that he bought for about ,000 and used that guitar throughout his tenure with the Allen Collins Band.
In late 1977, Collins began occasionally playing a
Gibson Les Paul Jr.
On "
Gimme Back My Bullets
", "
Sweet Home Alabama
", "
Every Mothers Son
" Collins used a Sunburst
Fender Stratocaster
after
Ed King
left. Collins has been filmed playing an all-black,
rosewood
fingerboard
Stratocaster
with white
single-coil
pickups
and white control knobs.
In 2003,
Gibson Guitars
honored Allen with a limited edition Explorer. The guitar is made of African limba wood (korina) and features an aged finished,
Maestro vibrola
, and classic
humbucking
pickups.
Ronnie Van Zant
Background information
Birth name
Ronald Wayne Van Zant
Born
(
1948-01-15
)
January 15, 1948
Jacksonville, Florida
, U.S.
Died
October 20, 1977
(1977-10-20)
(aged 29)
Gillsburg, Mississippi
, U.S.
Genres
Southern rock
,
blues rock
[1]
Occupation(s)
Musician, songwriter,
Instruments
Vocals, guitar, piano, drums
Years active
1964–1977
Associated acts
Lynyrd Skynyrd
Ronald Wayne Van Zant
(January 15, 1948 – October 20, 1977) was an American lead vocalist, singer, primary lyricist, and founding member of the
Southern rock
band
Lynyrd Skynyrd
. He was the older brother of two other rock vocalists: current Lynyrd Skynyrd lead vocalist
Johnny Van Zant
, and
Donnie Van Zant
, the founder and vocalist of
38 Special
. He was the father of Tammy Van Zant and Melody Van Zant.
[1]
Contents
1
Early life
2
Lynyrd Skynyrd
3
Death
4
Personal life
5
Legacy
6
Notes
7
References
8
External links
Early life
He was born and raised in
Jacksonville
, Florida, to Lacy Austin (1915–2004) and Marion Virginia (Hicks) Van Zant (1929–2000). Ronnie aspired to be many things before finding his love for music. Idolizing
boxer
Muhammad Ali
, he considered a career in the ring, and while playing
American Legion baseball
dreamed of
Minor League
success.
[2]
Referring to a local
NASCAR
legend, he would say that he was going to be the most famous person to come out of Jacksonville since
stock car champion
Lee Roy Yarbrough
.
[
citation needed
]
Lynyrd Skynyrd
Van Zant formed a band called My Backyard
[2]
late in the summer of 1964 with friends and schoolmates
Allen Collins
(guitar),
Gary Rossington
(guitar),
Larry Junstrom
(bass), and
Bob Burns
(drums). The foursome went through several names before deciding on Lynyrd Skynyrd, a mock tribute to a gym teacher that all but Collins had at
Robert E. Lee High School
,
Leonard Skinner
, who disapproved of male students with long hair.
The band's national exposure began in 1973 with the release of their debut album,
(Pronounced 'Lĕh-'nérd 'Skin-'nérd)
, which had a string of hits that included "I Ain't the One", "
Tuesday's Gone
", "
Gimme Three Steps
", "
Simple Man
," and what became their signature, "
Free Bird
", later dedicated to the late
Duane Allman
of
The Allman Brothers Band
.
[
citation needed
]
Lynyrd Skynyrd's biggest hit single was "
Sweet Home Alabama
" from their follow-up album
Second Helping
,
an answer to
Neil Young
's "Alabama" and "
Southern Man
." Young's song "
Powderfinger
" on the 1979 album
Rust Never Sleeps
was reportedly written for Skynyrd, and Van Zant is pictured on the cover of
Street Survivors
wearing a T-shirt of Young's
Tonight's the Night
[3]
and in the 2 July 1977
Oakland Coliseum
concert (excerpted in
Freebird... The Movie
).
[4]
Death
Main article:
1977 Convair CV-240 crash
On October 20, 1977, a plane carrying the band between shows from
Greenville, South Carolina
, to
Baton Rouge, Louisiana
, ran out of fuel outside
Gillsburg, Mississippi
. The passengers had been informed about potential problems with the
Convair CV-240
and were told to brace for a crash.
[5]
Van Zant died on impact from head injuries suffered after the
aircraft struck a tree
. Bandmates
Steve Gaines
and
Cassie Gaines
, along with assistant road manager Dean Kilpatrick, pilot Walter McCreary, and co-pilot William Gray, were also killed. The rest of the band was seriously injured.
[6]
Van Zant was 29 years old.
According to former bandmate
Artimus Pyle
and family members, Van Zant frequently discussed his mortality. Pyle recalls a moment when Lynyrd Skynyrd was in Japan: "Ronnie and I were in Tokyo, Japan, and Ronnie told me that he would never live to see thirty and that he would go out with his boots on, in other words, on the road. I said, 'Ronnie, don't talk like that,' but the man knew his destiny."
[7]
Van Zant's father, Lacy, said, "He said to me many times, 'Daddy, I'll never be 30 years old.' I said, 'What do you mean you'll never be 30 years old? Why are you talking this junk?' and he said, 'Daddy, that's my limit.'" Van Zant's father later noted that, "God was a jealous god. Taking him for reasons I don't know."
[7]
Ex-bandmate
Ed King
also reported hearing Van Zant saying he would never live to be 30 years old, saying Van Zant said it so often that he "had gotten sick of hearing it".
[8]
Lynyrd Skynyrd backup singer
JoJo Billingsley
recalled that Van Zant had begun referring to himself as "The Mississippi Kid" in the months before his death despite being born and raised in Florida. She noted that, eerily, Van Zant's only connection to Mississippi was the fact that he would ultimately die there.
[9]
Van Zant's younger brother,
Johnny
, took over as the new lead singer when the band reunited in 1987.
Ex-Lynyrd Skynyrd guitarist Ed King recalls the intense sadness of Van Zant's funeral, noting that people in attendance were so overcome with grief that they were literally falling down.
[8]
Van Zant was buried in
Orange Park, Florida
, in 1977. His body was relocated after vandals broke into his tomb and that of bandmate
Steve Gaines
on June 29, 2000. Van Zant's casket was pulled out and dropped on the ground. The bag containing Gaines' remains was torn open and some scattered onto the grass.
[10]
Their
mausoleums
at Orange Park remain as memorials for fans to visit.
According to the cemetery listing website
Find-a-Grave
, Van Zant was reburied at Riverside Memorial Park in Jacksonville, near the grave of his father Lacy and mother Marion. Both his current resting place and the empty mausoleum in Orange Park are listed, with the statement: "Due to the June 29th, 2000 vandalization of his original grave site, his casket was moved to this new location and buried in a massive underground concrete burial vault. To open the vault would require a tractor with a lift capacity of several tons. It is also patrolled by security."
[11]
Personal life
Van Zant married Nadine Inscoe on January 2, 1967. Around this time, Van Zant also worked at his brother-in-law's auto parts store, Morris Auto Parts in Jacksonville. It was said that Van Zant was a virtual catalog of automotive parts, he had a near photographic memory for them. The couple had a daughter named Tammy, before divorcing in 1969; Tammy would become a musician. He married Judy Seymour in 1972 after meeting her at The Comic Book Club through Gary Rossington in 1969.
[2]
(The club closed in 1975 and is now a parking garage.)
[12]
They remained married up until his death in 1977. They had one daughter, Melody, born in 1976. Judy Van Zant-Jenness founded the
Freebird Live
in 1999, a music venue located in
Jacksonville Beach, Florida
. It features Lynyrd Skynyrd memorabilia and is co-owned by Melody Van Zant. She married Jim Jenness and founded and ran The Freebird Foundation until its dissolution in 2001.
Van Zant was an avid fisherman. He enjoyed baseball, and was a fan of the
Chicago White Sox
and
New York Yankees
. As a child, he played American Legion baseball and aspired to play professional baseball, as he recalled in a 1975 interview.
[2]
Van Zant had several run-ins with the law, most notably in 1975, when he was arrested for hurling a table out of a second-story hotel room window.
[13]
[14]
Legacy
The
Ronnie Van Zant Memorial Park
, funded by fans and family of the band, was built on Sandridge Road in
Lake Asbury
, Florida, nearby his hometown of Jacksonville.
Several members of his family have memorialized Ronnie in their music. His brothers Johnny and Donnie co-wrote the title track of John's 1990 album "Brickyard Road"
[15]
with family friend and album producer Robert White Johnson. In the reformed Lynyrd Skynyrd's music video for the posthumously-released track "
What's Your Name
" closes with a white hat similar to Ronnie's sitting atop a microphone. Ronnie's daughter Tammy, who was only 10 years old when he died, dedicated the album title track, "Freebird Child" as well as the music video to her father in 2009.
[16]
Jimmie Van Zant recorded the tribute track "Ronnie's Song" on the album
Southern Comfort
(2000).
[17]
Alt country
band
Drive-By Truckers
also paid tribute to Ronnie and members of the original band on their
Southern Rock Opera
album.
"The All-Night Bus Ride", the 8th episode of Season 1 of the Showtime series
Roadies
, was made in honor of Van Zant and the band.
*********************************************************************************
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SELLERS PAST LIFE

I started working with the legendary LYNYRD SKYNYRD BAND late in 1973 , I was the third roadie I ever to be hired by LYNYRD SKYNYRD . I started as a drum roadie but I was the guitar tech most of the time and at the time of the crash . I was also the stage manager and production manager at different times in my career with them . LYNYRD SKYNYRD was one of the wildest groups of musicians who ever toured the rock and roll circuit . Some of the wild insodents included drinking , drugs , and fighting were made into songs written by band leader Ronnie Van Zant . Many People who worked for the LYNYRD SKYNYRD BAND never saw thirty years old . I survived the lifestyle that comes with working with a wild young band like LYNYRD SKYNYRD and being personal friend with each member and partying with each member was unbelievable , not to mention I also survived the LYNYRD SKYNYRD airplane crash October 20 , 1977 , Although I was seriously injured .

I also survived working with the Rossington Collins Band from 1979 through 1983 . Those years were crazy . Then I survived working with the Allen Collins Band in 1983. That year was insanity to say the least . I could have died many times in numerous situations during that period of my life . Before that I survived working as a guitar tech on world tours with Foreigner in 1978 & Journey in 1979 . Plus the Marshall Tucker Band from 1983 through 1987 . Then I survived working again with the new LYNYRD SKYNYRD tribute band from 1987 through 2006 .

When I say I survived all of the above you really would have had to have been there to totally understand I should have died many times like alot of my friends . During these years I did things that led me to get Hep C . Many band members died with this illness such as Leon , Billy and Allen , others in the band are dealing with this problem at this time , like me . I was released working with LYNYRD SKYNYRD in 2006 beause of complications with the treatment that included injections of a medicine that did not agree with me . Since I was released from the band I have been selling my precious collection of LYNYRD SKYNYRD memorabilia from my life with LYNYRD SKYNYRD from the past 40 years . I recently sold Allen Collins 1932 Plymouth 3 window coupe which was one of my most prized posessions , I was in the studio as a guitar tech for every album ever done by the original LYNYRD SKYNYRD BAND plus the ROSSINGTON COLLINS & ALLEN COLLINS BAND. I became close friends with each member of all the bands.