Many called him the "Wild Man" of the rock group Lynyrd Skynyrd, but Artimus Pyle started out more as a "Country Man." Thomas Delmar Pyle was born on July 15, 1948, in Louisville, KY. He spent many of his childhood hours either on the back of a horse or behind the controls of a bulldozer.
When Pyle was nine years old, his mother bought his first musical instruments, some bongos. Three years later his father got him a used set of drums. It wasn't long before young Pyle had put together his first band, the Thom Thumbs.
In the late '60s, fresh out of high school, Pyle joined ...