"Grey dog" = "Greyhound bus"

[Laurence Horn]

On Jun 5, 2014, at 3:03 PM, Jonathan Lighter wrote:

> Note 1956 ex. of "the joint" (jail or prison), pretty early for general pop
> culture.
>
> (Earlier in joint glossaries. See HDAS.)
>
> JL

My bad.  This was evidently one of Dolly's emendations to avoid the "man"/"can" rhyme.  The original first verse was actually:

Got in a little trouble at the county seat
                                              G7     C
Lord they put me in the jailhouse for loafing on the street

When the judge heard the verdict I was a guilty man
                                     G7          C
He said forty-five dollars or thirty days in the can

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WDbylmeOdaY


Sorry for the false lead.

LH

>
>
> On Thu, Jun 5, 2014 at 2:40 PM, Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu>
> wrote:
>
>> ---------------------- Information from the mail header
>> -----------------------
>> Sender:       American Dialect Society <ADS-L at LISTSERV.UGA.EDU>
>> Poster:       Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at YALE.EDU>
>> Subject:      Re: "Grey dog" = "Greyhound bus"
>>
>> -------------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>
>> There's a 1956 Louvin Brothers version, "Cash on the Barrelhead", that
>> I've have on my iTunes as performed by them, by Dolly Parton, by Gram
>> Parsons, and by Rhonda Vincent, all basically the same, in which the
>> Greyhound driver reminds the unfortunate cash-strappee that "this old grey
>> dog gets paid to run" (see last two verses):
>>
>> I got in a little trouble at the county seat
>> Lord, they put me in the jailhouse
>> For loafing on the street
>> Well, the judge said guilty
>> He made his point
>> He said forty-five dollars
>> Or thirty days in the joint
>>
>> That'll be cash on the barrelhead, hon'
>> You can take your choice
>> You're twenty-one
>> No money down
>> No credit plan
>> No time to chase you
>> Cause I'm a busy man
>>
>> I found a telephone number on a laundry slip
>> I had a good-hearted jailer
>> With a six gun hip
>> He let me call long distance
>> She said, "Number, please"
>> And just as soon as I told her
>> She shouted back at me
>>
>> Said that'll be cash on the barrelhead, hon'
>> Not part, not half
>> But the entire sum
>> No money down
>> No credit line
>> Cause a little bird tells me
>> You're the travelin' kind
>>
>> Thirty days in the jailhouse
>> Four days on the road
>> I was feelin' mighty hungry
>> My feet, a heavy load
>> I saw a Greyhound comin'
>> Stuck out my thumb
>> As soon as I was seated
>> The driver caught my arm
>>
>> Said that'll be cash on the barrelhead, hon'
>> This old, grey dog gets paid to run
>> When the engine starts
>> And the wheels will roll
>> Give me cash on the barrelhead
>> I take ya down the road
>> Ohh, cash on the barrelhead
>> I take you down the road
>>
>> [This is Dolly's version; for the Louvin Bros.', "hon'" > "son"]
>>
>> LH
>>
>>
>>
>>
>> On Jun 5, 2014, at 1:00 PM, George Thompson wrote:
>>
>>> Not a very clever bit of slang, but not in HDAS nor Greene's Dictionary.
>>>
>>> (Background: I've pointed out here before a radio station emanating from
>>> Poughkeepsie that by policy plays chiefly American popular and folk music
>>> recorded before 1970 -- WHVW.  It's an exceeding low-watt station with
>> very
>>> limited broadcast range, perhaps 25 or 30 miles from Poughkeepsie.  About
>>> half of the week  it carries music with no-one on mike, using a
>>> proto-Shuffle known to its intimates as Murray the Machine.  These
>> sessions
>>> are pleasurable but frustrating, since often hear familiar songs I can't
>>> recall, and more often interesting songs I'd like to have identified.)
>>>
>>> Yesterday evening I heard a song whose title might be "Restless", sung
>> by a
>>> man, in white-country style, which contained the words "grey dog" in a
>>> context that referred to travel by bus.  This morning I heard a song
>> whose
>>> title might be "Cash on the Barrel", sung by a man, in white-country
>>> style.  This song chronicles the misadventures of a travelling man who
>> has
>>> no money and in each stanza is told he needs to put cash on the barrel.
>> In
>>> one stanza he flags a bus to get out of town, but the driver tells him he
>>> needs to put. . . .  The bus is called both a Greyhound and a Grey Dog.
>>> This station has been introducing me to white-country music, I listening
>>> otherwise mostly to jazz and black-country music -- and classical.  So, a
>>> not very well informed guess dates both these records to the late 1940s
>> or
>>> early-mid 1950s.
>>>
>>> I had urged you all to look for this station if you should ever be in its
>>> broadcast range.  Since then, it has become accessible through its
>> website.
>>>
>>> http://www.whvw.net/
>>>
>>> You will be likely to hear Joe Turner, Gid Tanner, Jimmie Rodgers, Al
>>> Jolson, Cecil Gant, Marion Harris, Bert Williams, Louie Jordan, the Mound
>>> City Blue Blowers, Erskine Hawkins, Bob Wills, among others.  I'll be
>>> forever grateful for having been introduced to Gant and Harris.  Check it
>>> out.
>>>
>>> GAT
>>>
>>> --
>>> George A. Thompson
>>> The Guy Who Still Looks Stuff Up in Books.
>>> Author of A Documentary History of "The African Theatre", Northwestern
>>> Univ. Pr., 1998..
>>>
>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
>>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>
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>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>>
>
>
>
> --
> "If the truth is half as bad as I think it is, you can't handle the truth."
>
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