Leonard Skinner, the high school gym teacher that inspired Lynyrd Skynyrd name, died on Monday (September 20th) after suffering from Alzheimer’s disease. The Florida Times-Union reported that Skinner was 77. Skinner’s name has passed into rock folklore as being the gym teacher at Jacksonville Florida’s Robert E. Lee High School who sent future Skynyrd members Bob Burns and Gary Rossington to the assistant principal’s office due to the length of their hair.
According to legend, the musicians, who were in a band called the One Percent, had several running jokes about Skinner and eventually re-named the band Lynyrd Skynyrd as a sarcastic mispronunciation of the hard-nosed gym teacher’s name. In later years, Skinner defended his action of throwing the future rockers out of his class, stating: “It was against the school rules. I don’t particularly like long hair on men, but again, it wasn’t my rule.

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