Bobbie Gentry’s 1967 hit single “Ode to Billie Joe” launched Gentry, who went to grade school in Greenwood, to international stardom. Now a marker on the Mississippi Country Music Trail will honor Gentry, the town she called home and the Tallahatchie River, which inspired her biggest hit.
The new marker, which will be on Grand Boulevard just south of the Tallahatchie Bridge, is set to be unveiled at a ceremony at 10 a.m. Thursday. The Greenwood Convention and Visitors Bureau and the Mississippi Development Authority will host the event, which is open to the public at no charge.
Local officials will speak about Gentry and reveal the new marker at the ceremony. Light refreshments will be served, and the Greenwood band The Firm will perform several Gentry tunes.
“Ode to Billie Joe” was Gentry’s breakthrough hit. The song tells the story of a young man who jumps off the Tallahatchie Bridge — although which bridge has remained the source of some controversy.
The song was adapted as a 1976 Hollywood film starring Robby Benson and Glynnis O’Connor. The movie was filmed mostly in Greenwood, and a since-demolished bridge over the Yazoo River in Sidon played the part of the Tallahatchie Bridge.
Gentry was born Roberta Lee Streeter in Chickasaw County on July 27, 1944. She spent her early years living with her grandparents in rural Chickasaw before moving with her divorced father to Greenwood to attend grade school.
Attracted to blues, gospel and country music from a very young age, Gentry taught herself to play the piano by closely watching the choir pianist in church. She began composing original tunes by the age of 7.
At 13, she left Greenwood to live with her mother in California, where she taught herself guitar, banjo and bass and took the stage name of Bobbie Gentry, after the rags-to-riches backwoods title character of the 1952 film “Ruby Gentry.”
While a high school student in Palm Springs, Calif., Gentry began playing in clubs throughout the area. She worked briefly as a chorus dancer in Las Vegas before studying philosophy at UCLA and then transferring to the Los Angeles Conservatory of Music.
Capital Records signed Gentry in 1967 and quickly released her first single, the blues-infused tune “Mississippi Delta.” It was the single’s B-side — “Ode to Billie Joe” — that was the real hit, though; it went on to sell more than 3 million copies.
The song’s mysterious lyrics, which included the line, “She and Billie Joe was throwing something off the Tallahatchie Bridge,” were the source of much speculation. Gentry declined to name what the two threw off the bridge.
“Billie Joe” was the first in a long string of hits by Gentry, who quickly became one of the biggest stars and most influential songwriters in country music.
Gentry married twice during her years of stardom, first to casino magnate Bill Harrah in 1969 and then to comedian and singer Jim Stafford, with whom she had a son. She retired from show business in 1982 and has since remarried. She currently lives in California.
Paige Hunt, director of the Greenwood Convention and Visitors Bureau, said this will be the first Country Music Trail marker in Leflore County. The county is home to nine blues trail markers as well as two markers on the Mississippi Freedom Trail, which follows the history of the civil rights movement in the state.
• Contact Bryn Stole at 581-7235 or bstole@gwcommonwealth.com.
