3rd of June.....

[Big Muddy]

"""It was the 3rd of June, another sleepy, dusty, Delta day.
I was out choppin' cotton, and my brother was balin' hay."""

[Thumper]

And at dinner time we stopped and walked back to the house to eat
And Mama hollered out the back door, "Y'all remember to wipe your feet"

Note: I lived in Vicksburg at the time.

[HideHunter]

So what did they throw off the bridge? ;)

[Thumper]

So what did they throw off the bridge? ;)

From Wikipedia:

... Gentry said in a November 1967 interview that it was the question most asked of her by everyone she met .... Although she knew definitely what the item was, she would not reveal it, .....

[Captain]

The most common theory is that Billy Joe and the speaker were indeed involved in some degree of romantic / sexual relationship that was kept hidden from the speaker's family because the father strongly disliked Billy Joe. This in turn is commonly interpreted as meaning the couple had an unplanned child at some point, and they threw the baby off the bridge together rather than deal with this manifestation of their illicit relationship. The guilt stemming from the murder of his own child later in turn caused Billy Joe to kill himself.

Some have gone even further and speculated that because the child was unwanted, it was either stillborn or aborted in some haphazard fashion, and then quietly "disposed" of off the bridge to hide the proof that the pregnancy had ever occurred. I've heard some point to the relevance of the "Child, what's happened to your appetite" line as a subtle key to this. Loss of appetite commonly occurs after giving birth. But it also commonly occurs when someone is depressed.

[HideHunter]

I knew there was extreme controversy over the question. I think I even googled it a few years ago and never got a definitive answer. Heard the "baby" theory - but never saw it explained to that detail. One of life's great mysteries - like; who left the cake out in the rain? and "who" this song is about. ;)

[BarryBobPosthole]

I think they were throwing dynamite off the bridge. Everybody knows that's how they fish for catfish down in the Delta.

BKB

[Thumper]

Wiki:

The song is a first-person narrative that reveals a Southern Gothic tale in its verses by including the dialog of the narrator's family at dinnertime on the day that "Billie Joe McAllister jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge." Throughout the song, the suicide and other tragedies are contrasted against the banality of everyday routine and polite conversation.

The song begins with the narrator and her brother returning, after morning chores, to the family house for dinner (on June 3). After cautioning them about tracking in dirt, "Mama" says that she "got some news this mornin' from Choctaw Ridge" that "Billie Joe McAllister jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge," apparently to his death.

At the dinner table, the narrator's father is unsurprised at the news and says, "Well, Billie Joe never had a lick o' sense; pass the biscuits, please" and mentions that there are "five more acres in the lower forty I got to plow." Although her brother seems to be taken aback ("I saw him at the sawmill yesterday.... And now you tell me Billie Joe has jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge"), he's not shocked enough to keep him from having a second piece of pie. The brother recalls that while he was with his friends Tom and Billy Joe, that Billy Joe put a frog down the narrator's back at the Carroll County Picture Show, and also saw them last Sunday speaking after church. Late in the song, Mama questions the narrator's complete change of mood ("Child, what's happened to your appetite? I been cookin' all mornin' and you haven't touched a single bite") and then recalls a visit earlier that morning by Brother Taylor, the local preacher, who mentioned that he had seen Billie Joe and a girl who looked very much like the narrator herself and they were "throwin' somethin' off the Tallahatchie Bridge."

In the song's final verse, a year has passed, during which the narrator's brother has married Becky Thompson, and moved away ("bought a store in Tupelo"). Also, her father died from a viral infection, which has left her mother despondent. ("And now mama doesn't seem to wanna do much of anything".) The narrator herself now visits Choctaw Ridge often, picking flowers there to drop from the Tallahatchie Bridge onto the murky waters flowing beneath.

Questions arose among the listeners: what did Billie Joe and his girlfriend throw off the Tallahatchie Bridge, and why did Billie Joe commit suicide? Speculation ran rampant after the song hit the airwaves, and Gentry said in a November 1967 interview that it was the question most asked of her by everyone she met. She named flowers, a ring, a draft card, a bottle of LSD pills, and an aborted baby as the most often guessed items. Although she knew definitely what the item was, she would not reveal it, saying only "Suppose it was a wedding ring." "It's in there for two reasons," she said. "First, it locks up a definite relationship between Billie Joe and the girl telling the story, the girl at the table. Second, the fact that Billie Joe was seen throwing something off the bridge – no matter what it was – provides a possible motivation as to why he jumped off the bridge the next day."

When Herman Raucher met Gentry in preparation for writing a novel and screenplay based on the song, she confessed that she had no idea why Billie Joe killed himself. Gentry has, however, commented on the song, saying that its real theme was indifference:

“Those questions are of secondary importance in my mind. The story of Billie Joe has two more interesting underlying themes. First, the illustration of a group of peoples' reactions to the life and death of Billie Joe, and its subsequent effect on their lives, is made. Second, the obvious gap between the girl and her mother is shown when both women experience a common loss (first Billie Joe, and later, Papa), and yet Mama and the girl are unable to recognize their mutual loss or share their grief.”

The bridge mentioned in this song collapsed in June 1972. It crossed the Tallahatchie River at Money, about ten miles north of Greenwood, Mississippi, and has since been replaced. The November 10, 1967 issue of Life Magazine contained a photo of Gentry crossing the original bridge.

[quercus alba]

always hated that song. almost as bad as "Wildfire" and I shot the sheriff.

[Niner]

Thump, didn't you say a while back (maybe last June :) ) that you had a snapshot of that bridge?
Or am I disrememberizing?



Funny thing there, QA....I always liked that song.
I'll betcha you don't like "Edmund Fitzgerald" either. :biggrin

[Captain]

I always like the Ode to Billy Joe and The wreck of the Edmond Fitzgerald, but I'm with QA on Wildfire. Always hated that song. But the song I absolutely HATE and have ALWAYS hated is Riders on the Storm by The Doors I think....
I can change the radio station before the third note is played.
In fact I hate I even thought about it. Now it will be in my head for the next while.

Sent from my iPhone using Forum Runner

[quercus alba]

I like anything by Gordon Lightfoot, I absolutely despise "Swanging" tho