JoJo Billingsley (Born Deborah Jo White)
1952 – June 24, 2010
JoJo Billingsley was a songwriter and vocalist who is perhaps best remembered as a member of the “Honkettes,” the so-nicknamed back-up singers for Lynyrd Skynyrd for nearly four years. Billingsley joined the group in 1975, touring the world during their peak years. That all came to a tragic end on October 20, 1977 when she was the only member of the band not killed in a plane crash that took the lives of Ronnie Van Zant, Cassie Gaines, Steve Gaines, Dean Kilpatrick (the band’s road manager) the pilot and co-pilot. Billingsley has always maintained that she had a dream that the plane would crash just two nights prior and tried to stop the others from taking it. The accident lead her to devote her life to the Lord as both a singer and later, minister. In 2006, she reunited with the then-current members of Lynyrd Skynyrd at a their induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. She also performed with members of the group at occasional charity or memorial events in recent years. Jojo Billingsley was 58 when she died of cancer on June 24, 2010.
Thanks to Craig Rosen of Number1Albums for the assist.