It was 46 years and 21 days ago today (Friday June 3, 1966) that Billy Joe McAllister jumped off the Tallahatchie Bridge (today’s date is Sunday June 24, 2012).
Assuming that it happened on the 3rd of June, ”another sleepy dusty delta day”. And later in the song Bobby Gentry sings, "a year has come and gone since we heard the news about Billy Joe". So we must assume that the song was written the next year. The song was written and copywrited in 1967 and first hit #1 on the Hot 100 on August 26th and it stayed there for 4 weeks. So this song is about a slice of Americana from June of 1966, except for the fact that it never happened (this was a work of fiction). Still, all in all in was a great tune. Disregarding the cheesy movie, what do you suppose Billy Joe was really throwing off the Tallahatchie Bridge???
It, so far, has received no responses. Although I haven't seen the movie, I've always had my (to me) "obvious" assumption about the answer to that question, but I'll let others have a go at answering it here.