Madison Taylor

Not long after I moved to Eastern North Carolina in 1992 I was instructed in the correct way to pronounce Duplin County.

My first inclination was all wrong. I tried Dup-lin, emphasizing the duh sound. My new coworkers quickly instructed me differently.

“It’s doo-plin,” they said.

Other than that, though, I didn’t know much about the farming county that borders Onslow County. I learned that Duplin County has a lot of historic sites, is home to legendary historic state leaders, tops the nation in the production of hogs and sweet potatoes, has a pretty fine winery in Rose Hill and is now famous for being the county that ran Willie Nelson out of town.

True story. There’s even a song about it.

Now this last piece of noteworthy Duplin news came in January when country singer and songwriter Willie Nelson — for reasons I’m not too clear on — was booked to play the Duplin County Events Center in Kenansville.

Only he never did.

Usually you think of celebrities performing in large venues like the Greensboro Coliseum. Nelson himself has sung in lots of large places during his long and illustrious career. But he’s played plenty of small places, too. When you’re considered an “outlaw,” well, anything goes.

But on Jan. 28, Nelson abruptly cancelled his Kenansville show citing a wrist injury. He did so right there in the parking lot with lots of people arriving to see the band.

Few in Duplin County are buying that story. What most there believe is that Willie took his band and went home after six members of his group were cited on marijuana and possession of non-tax-paid alcohol charges by the state Alcohol Law Enforcement. The ALE boys, were there to help the understaffed Kenansville police. They even had a name for their work that night, “Operation on the Road Again.”

What a lot of Duplin County people think is that the state trapped Nelson and his band because – let’s face it – Willie’s been known to tip back a drink here and there and inhale the weed a time or two.

The case even raised the hackles of state Sen. Charlie Albertson, a Democrat from Beulaville who’s a singer and songwriter in his own right. He’s the front man for the Charlie Albertson Band and his latest recording is called, “Leave the Man Alone.” Albertson, who isn’t not seeking re-election, calls out the ALE and said so as well in a story by our Raleigh reporter Barry Smith.  We have audio of Albertson singing the song posted with the story.

The ALE says its agents were just doing their jobs.

But 70-year-old Sylvia Hawes of Rose Hill looks at the matter differently. Hawes told our reporter that no one blames Nelson for pulling out of the concert. “They blame the law enforcement for coming in and trying to play cowboy,” Hawes said.

One of the lines in the song pretty much sums it up, “It was over before it started, the law busted Willie’s band.”

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