Rock legend Bob Dylan was treated like a complete unknown by police in a New Jersey shore community when a resident called to report someone wandering around the neighborhood.
Dylan was in Long Branch, about a two-hour drive south of New York City, on July 23 as part of a tour with Willie Nelson and John Mellencamp that was to play at a baseball stadium in nearby Lakewood.
A 24-year-old police officer apparently was unaware of who Dylan is and asked him for identification, Long Branch business administrator Howard Woolley said Friday.
"I don't think she was familiar with his entire body of work," Woolley said.
The incident began at 5 p.m. when a resident said a man was wandering around a low-income, predominantly minority neighborhood several blocks from the oceanfront looking at houses.
The police officer drove up to Dylan, who was wearing a blue jacket, and asked him his name. According to Woolley, the following exchange ensued:
"What is your name, sir?" the officer asked.
"Bob Dylan," Dylan said.
"OK, what are you doing here?" the officer asked.
"I'm on tour," the singer replied.
A second officer, also in his 20s, responded to assist the first officer. He, too, apparently was unfamiliar with Dylan, Woolley said.
The officers asked Dylan for identification. The singer of such classics as "Like a Rolling Stone" and "Blowin' in the Wind" said that he didn't have any ID with him, that he was just walking around looking at houses to pass some time before that night's show.
The officers asked Dylan, 68, to accompany them back to the Ocean Place Resort and Spa, where the performers were staying. Once there, tour staff vouched for Dylan.
The officers thanked him for his cooperation.
"He couldn't have been any nicer to them," Woolley added.
How did it feel? A Dylan publicist did not immediately return a telephone call seeking comment Friday.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5iy8jnlcZu7jfNUS3KQ5phFhctnBQD9A2UAHO1
Another story that makes me feel old. The cops were so young that they'd never heard of Bob Dylan? That's quite a generation gap. Of course, when you record an album of Christmas songs (see my earlier post) you're destined to slip into obscurity.
2 comments:
A story from another source said the first officer in fact, did know who Bob Dylan was -- but only from his photograph on early Dylan albums, which she did like to listen to. She was skeptical because this disheveled mumbling bum in a blue hoodie didn't seem to look anything like the pictures on those albums.
But it makes a better story to say that she didn't know there was a singer-songwriter named "Bob Dylan". Sort of like I invented the quote for her, "Yeah, and I'm Barbara Streisand." :).
Code word: "dicura". Sounds like a gay sex position or somethin'. Huh.
::sigh::
These cops are older than me, yet I cannot imagine seeing Bob Dylan anywhere and not immediately going absolutely nuts. :)
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