It might also be worth mentioning that The Battle Hymn of the Republic was probably sung by at least one Yankee on his way home from the South at the end of the Civil War.
Or not. I’ll ask Bruce if I ever see him in another N.J. record store.
I’m over a decade late to this party, but I got here because I too was wondering what Wayne did in Darlington County to get arrested. You want some overthinking? Here you go…
Verse 1- 800 miles from NYC to Darlington County? Even without GPS, cars have odometers. You’d have to be taking some back roads or a wide divergence to make 650 miles into 800, and they were apparently watching for cops to notice that they saw none. Since they were looking, they were probably keen NOT to see any cops. Why? Maybe they just liked to speed, with the tunes cranked. Possibly, they were in a stolen car. Maybe was more innocent; young guys in sporty cars get pulled over a lot, even if they arent obviously doing something wrong.
And this was a sporty car. It was a T-top. Probably not brand new, since they’re young and looking for work. 70s to early 80s T-tops: Corvettes, Camaros, Trans Ams, some Mustangs, some Thunderbirds, and some El Dorados… A Corvette? No. Too sexy and smooth for these guys. You’re not getting any girls in a Thunderbird or El Dorado, and they are looking for girls, specifically girls less savvy than those in NYC, who " just want to know your name," and not what your dick tastes like. Maybe a Mustang, but those are dude magnets, not chick magnets. So Camaro or Trans Am. Probably Trans Am. The Bandit drove a Trans Am.
In addition to girls, he and Wayne are looking for work. Darlington County is not much of a going concern. And there is virtually nothing of any import anywhere on the county line that might be hiring, other than the Duke energy plants, including the Robinson nuclear plant. Energy plant work is a good paying union job, but these guys are no nuclear engineers. Plus, the lower skill jobs at the plants are probably fully staffed already - again there’s not a lot of choice in Darlington County - if you’ve got a good factory job, you try to keep it. So the only work to be done on the county line is probably road work, for the county itself. They always are looking for young, strapping men to stand around, leaning on a shovel. County work is confirmed later in the song.
Verse 2 - So many people replying here that the “little girl standing on the corner” is a prostitute… Why? Because she’s standing on a corner? What the hell else are the kids gonna do, in Darlington County, except hang around on the corner, outside the Circle K? Especially if you’re too young to drive and cruise The Strip? She’s not working that corner as a pro. A professional knows that $200 is not “big-spender” money, and is NOT going to get two guys rocked all night. Maybe for an hour. Two, if they are unlucky.
A pro wouldn’t be impressed by this John and his buddy, Wayne, being from New York City. She wouldn’t fall for that stupid World Trade Centers line, and hookers don’t work for a kiss and a smile.
No, this is a young, naive, country gal, who might be swayed by fancy talk, dreams of the big city, and to whom $200 might seem like a lot of money. Heck, that’s like six months of babysitting money. How young is she? We don’t know; she doesn’t tell, but even more telling, the narrator isn’t asking. He knows she’s young and naive enough to be wooed by his bullshit… and he doesn’t care. He likes 'em young, and when the opportunity arises, too young may be less of a moral or statutory question, than a logistical one. (Sidenote: This is a recurring theme in music, 70s, 80s, and before); I’m on Fire, My Sharona, Don’t Stand So Close To Me, Into the Night, Come On Eileen, Christine Sixteen, Jailbait… and it’s not just older men and younger girls. Joan Jett was robbing the cradle, in I Love Rock and Roll.) He’s offering her something more exciting than the usual corner-loiter, for the long night, and suggests that they could, “Sha la la, sha la la la la,” a lyrical euphemism for sex, if ever there was one. And that form of entertainment is the “glory” and the “coming” that is later referred to, in verse three.
Verse 3 - Probably the same young girl, now sitting in the window, rather than hanging out on the corner, because the narrator discusses Wayne’s absence, as if she’s already familiar with his buddy. Maybe, because she’s now at least seven days older, and at least one guy wiser, she may now be at the start of a career as a pro, sitting in a window, like merchandise, rather than innocently hanging on the corner, with her friends.
Now on to Wayne. Where is he? Why hasn’t he been working, as the County man reports? We don’t know how they got separated, but we do know that the narrator has the car (he’s offering to drive his pretty, pubescent paramour out of Darlington County and off to their future, down the Dixie Highway) and that means Wayne doesn’t have the car. Maybe that’s why he hasn’t been getting to work. Maybe, since there’s no discussion of his attempted romantic escapades, he achieved no successes in that arena, either. Perhaps, with no girl on his arm, he used his share of the $200 to purchase a party in powder, pill, or potion form. And now he’s making other bad choices. Like stealing a car.
How do we know he did this? As the narrator drives out of the county, he sees Wayne handcuffed to a State Trooper’s Ford. Staties don’t generally handle in-town crimes, like drugs, burglary, or statutory rape. They’d be handling state and county crimes, including highway infractions, like the one that got Wayne arrested. On the side of the road. Narrator has the T-top. Wayne must have obtained some other car, to be getting arrested on the side of the highway, and he sure didn’t obtain it with whatever was left of the $100.
The narrator has no choice but to abandon Wayne. He has no knowledge of Wayne’s activities for the past week, so he can’t supply a believable alibi. The Staties have Wayne dead to rights, with a car he didn’t buy, and Narrator may be heading out of the state, with an underage girl at his side, if she actually is running away with him. And if she stayed behind and he stopps to offer and defense of Wayne, he may end up saying something under questioning, that reveals his statutory rape beef. Wayne got himself into this mess,and there’s nothing narrator can do to help.
There you go. My twenty-two cents.
Worth much more than that. When I realized that this was a resurrected zombie I wondered if it was Wayne, now paroled, come along to let us know what happened.
This thing puzzled me when I first heard the song:
“Seen Wayne handcuffed to the bumper of a state trooper’s Ford”
Is there any way the state troopers would do this as part of a regular roadside arrest? Are they going to drag him after the car, hurting, possibly killing him?