- He wrote "Lucille" and "There Ain't No Good Chain Gang"
- His son, Christopher David Bynum, is the production coordinator at the Tisch Center for the Arts at the 92nd Street Y in New York. He is a graduate of the University of Denver.
- Attended Texas Tech in Lubbock, Texas.
- Has two sons, Scott Thomas and Christopher.
- Had a sister, Mary Jo Bynum Colegrove.
- Served in the United States Navy aboard the USS Antietam aircraft carrier and was honorably discharged in 1959.
- He moved to Nashville in 1968 and had a posthumous hit by Jim Reeves (Nobody's Fool). He wrote for Charley Pride and later for Mary John Wilkins' publishing company. During this time, he had songs recorded by Ernest Tubb, Johnny Cash, Bill Monroe, Waylon Jennings, Jeanne Pruitt, Ralph Stanley, Little Jimmy Dickens and many others.
- Mother Maggie Virginia Compton and father Thomas Logan Bynum.
- His big break came in 1977 when Kenny Rogers recorded "Lucille," a song Hal had begun writing while in the Navy and re-worked with Roger Bowling. "Lucille" earned both CMA and ACM song of the year awards. This was quickly followed by "There Ain't No Good Chain Gang," a duet by Johnny Cash and Waylon Jennings (co-written with Dave Kirby) which was also covered by Merle Haggard. Hal had another number one hit in 1990, with "Chains," co-written with Bud Reneau and recorded by Patty Loveless.
- In the late 1990s, Hal began a second career as a spoken-word recording artist after recording an album produced by Jim Ed Norman on Warner Bros. Records entitled, If I Could Do Anything (1998). He followed that with two more albums on his own label, The Promise (2002) and An American Prayer (2004).
- His first recorded song, "I'm Hot to Trot," was cut in 1953 by Terry Fell and by the early sixties he had had songs cut by several top recording artists, including George Jones and Wynn Stewart.
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