The Time Waylon Jennings Went “Tourist Hunting” in Nashville
Towards the tail end of Waylon’s life, he was known for being quite the cantankerous fellow. For example, in September of 1998, Jennings was scheduled to appear on the Late Late Show hosted by Tom Snyder. Going into the taping, Waylon was already a little bit sideways with the situation because he thought he deserved a full hour slot, but instead the show’s producers had him sharing the show with Dr. Laura. When Dr. Laura’s segment began to eat into Waylon’s portion of the show, he walked off the set, leaving Tom Snyder hanging for the last 17 minutes of the program with no guest.
At the time, Waylon Jennings was not in the best of physical health. He was suffering from heart and back problems, and diabetes gave him issues with his feet and hands. Doctors had told him in 1998 to quit touring, and he sold off much of his equipment. When he did perform, Waylon was forced to sit on a stool, unable to stand for the two hours of a show. But that didn’t stop him from pulling off on of the most unusual table turns in entertainment history, which occurred 20 years ago this week.
One of Waylon’s biggest pet peeves at the time was how buses full of tourists on guided tours of Nashville would stop in front of his driveway and take hundreds of photos a day of his private residence. The situation came to a fevered pitch on June 5th, 1999 while Waylon and Andy Griggs were in his home trying to write songs together. Unable to focus on the music from the tourist buses constantly pulling up to the foot of the driveway, Waylon decided to do something about it. “The more mad he got, the more I egged him on,” Griggs later said about the incident.
But Waylon didn’t pull out a shotgun to chase the the tourists off, or flip the bird at the flashbulbs as they invaded his privacy. Instead he hatched a plan to turn the tables on the tourists—something he’d been scheming to do in his head for a while, but he couldn’t find anyone else to help him as a willing accomplice. ″[Andy Griggs] is the one guy that would do it with me. Johnny Cash wouldn’t even do it,” Waylon said at the time.
So what exactly did Waylon do? He and Andy Griggs jumped into Waylon’s gold-trimmed black Cadillac, and armed with an arsenal of disposable cameras, they went “tourist hunting” as it would later be coined. For over two hours, Waylon and Andy Griggs drove around ambushing and pulling over tourist buses on the streets of Nashville, barging on board like a couple of old train robbers, and taking rapid fire pictures of unsuspecting and shocked tourists as they sat in their seats. As soon as the pair of country singers had bagged all the tourists on a given bus, they would move on to another, hunting a total of seven buses full of tourists that day before retiring back to Waylon’s residence grinning from ear to ear.
Waylon may have been in poor health, but he never lost his Outlaw attitude, or his sense of humor. Many got a photo of Waylon’s home in Nashville over the years, but only a few lucky tourists can brag Waylon got a photo of them.
Waylon Jennings died on February 13th, 2002 due to complications with diabetes.
Atomic Zombie Redneck
June 8, 2019 @ 9:36 am
What a great story, way to go Waylon.
Heyday
June 8, 2019 @ 10:06 am
Whatever happened to the photos they took?
TXMUSICJIM
June 8, 2019 @ 10:51 am
Pure unadulterated greatness!!! RIP MAESTRO!!!
Seth of Lampasas
June 8, 2019 @ 11:10 am
How exactly did they “pull over the buses”?
Trigger
June 8, 2019 @ 11:39 am
Seth,
Quit leaving extremely negative comments on articles (not this one, but the others that have been deleted). You are actively trolling, and it is disrespectful to this community. You have been warned about this before. You comments will continue to get deleted, and I will move to further restrict your comments unless you show some respect for this community, and commit to being a healthy member of it. Dissent is fine. Actively trying to devolve comments sections into slag pits will not be tolerated. Final warning.
King Honky Of Crackershire
June 9, 2019 @ 12:29 pm
Trig,
I’m strangely relieved to discover that I’m not the only one of your loyal readers that you treat like crap.
ScottG
June 9, 2019 @ 2:47 pm
Hey where can I get one of them victim cards?
Seth of the Wilderness
June 9, 2019 @ 10:48 pm
I got tired of being edited for stupid shit, and i also got tired of the claims of a democratic comment section when in actuality the benevolent dictator is running a technoautocracy.
ScottG
June 8, 2019 @ 1:24 pm
I never understood tabloid culture or the harassment of celebrities. People excuse it by saying that celebrities give up their privacy when they become a star. That’s such bullshit. They are every bit as human as anyone else. The only thing that’s “given up” in those situations is a sense of decency.
Fun story.
Luckyoldsun
June 8, 2019 @ 2:42 pm
Trig–
Tom Snyder’s late night/(early morning) program on NBC was called the “Tomorrow Show.”
Big Red
June 8, 2019 @ 9:22 pm
Yes, Tom Snyder’s Tomorrow Show ran on NBC from 1973 to 1982. Snyder also hosted the first incarnation of The Late, Late Show on CBS, hosting from 1995 to 1999.
The linked Youtube clip recounting Waylon walking off the set confirms this was, indeed, The Late, Late Show.
Luckyoldsun
June 10, 2019 @ 12:39 am
You got me there. I stand corrected. Apologies to Trig. Now that you mention it, I recall that when Letterman got his 11:30 pm show on CBS, as part of his deal they gave him the next hour to executive produce and program, and he picked Tom Snyder–a blast from the past–to host it. I had completely forgotten about that.
WT
June 8, 2019 @ 3:23 pm
Andy Griggs, hadn’t heard that name in a long time. Good read, I bet those pics were great.
Reasonable Mainstream Country Fan
June 8, 2019 @ 6:26 pm
Like a couple of old train robbers! Awesomely!
Christopher Burrell
June 8, 2019 @ 7:26 pm
Ol Hoss, always had a great sense of humor, even until the day he died…what a legend, there will never be another one like Wayemore.
Steel&Antlers
June 8, 2019 @ 8:46 pm
Waylon Forever!
Trey
June 9, 2019 @ 9:49 am
Pick it, Moon !
Hank didn’t do it that way…. Even dead, Waylon still kicks ass.