Allen Collins 1976

Allen Collins 1976, hand-drawn with his 1964 Gibson Firebird 1 with it’s ABM Hopf Vibrato, backstage at the RFK Stadium on May 30, 1976, age 24, before performing with Lynyrd Skynyrd.

Larkin Allen Collins was an American guitarist. He was one of the founding members and guitarists of the southern rock band Lynyrd Skynyrd, and co-wrote many of the band’s songs with frontman and original lead singer Ronnie Van Zant.

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. They were then known as The One Percent.

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.

On January 29, 1986, 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 as a result of his injuries.

Allen Collins died on January 23, 1990, from chronic pneumonia, a complication of the paralysis. He is buried beside his wife in Jacksonville, Florida. He was 37.

In 2006, Collins was posthumously inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame as a member of Lynyrd Skynyrd.

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