Graceland Part II

Thursday  May 5, 2011

Site #74

Graceland RV Park

Memphis, Tennessee

After being at the Graceland Home,

we stopped in at Rockabilly's Burger Shop for lunch

before going on to the other exhibits.

It’s a great period diner where you can get the typical

burger baskets of all types

AND

Elvis’s favorite sandwich, peanut butter and bananas

on white bread fried in butter.  Hmmmmmm.

Sorry no pic of the sandwich.  But you'll hear about it later.

There is a working vintage jukebox which

actually displays other songs than Elvis'.

Like things by Nat King Cole and Patti Page

but I don't think anyone ever plays them.

J

This was definitely David's kind of place.

He LOVES period diners and

looks for them all across the country.

 

After lunch David wanted to see the Automobile Museum.

This was his favorite exhibit and he

took pictures, sometimes multiples,

of every car in it.

Here are just a FEW of them.

This 1966 White Rolls Royce Silver Cloud

has blue leather seats and walnut dashboard paneling.

After Elvis traded it in, it was owned by Michael Landon and Charlie Rich.

 

Love the story of this 1960 MG.

Elvis used it in the movie Blue Hawaii.

He then gave it to his secretary who traded it in.

A chef on his movie Spinout bought it

and gave it to his daughter as a wedding present.

Some wedding present. 

I owned a 1967 MGB earlier in my life and it was tons of fun!

Legend has it that this 1970 Stutz Blackhawk was ordered

for Frank Sinatra but Elvis charmed the

car dealer out of it.

It was the first Stutz Blackhawk delivered in the United States.

Love the colors of these cadillacs.

I know his mother drove the pink one.

But I thought this was her favorite color.

It was white when he got it but he had it painted and the interior "customized"

David in his element with camera in hand.

I should explain that when I met him

(IF you can believe this)

David owned a 1950 Ford which was his only car

and a 1974 Harley Davidson Superglide.

The car was for rainy days.  J

There are even more cars

that Elvis once owned in another larger museum

located in his home town of Tupelo, Mississippi. 

Share the wealth I guess. 

Apparently every car Elvis ever owned even for a year

and cars he gave to others

have been recovered and are on display at either

Tupelo or Graceland.

Or at least that’s how it seemed.

Next was the “Elvis! His Groundbreaking, Hip-Shaking, Newsmaking Story” exhibit.

This exhibit was prepared by the Newseum in Washington DC

and was shown there during 2010, Elvis’ 75^th Birthday Year.

Now isn’t that's an amazing thought,

a 75 year old Elvis. 

But perhaps not,

it does seem old rockers rock forever.

The Newseum exhibit, has a video of his first TV appearances

and tells the story of how he was portrayed in the news media

and how his music and “physicality” (as they called it) 

affected main stream tastes and free expression.

On January 10, 1956, two days after he turned 21,

Elvis recorded Heartbreak Hotel and over 300,000 copies

of this single sold in its first three weeks on the market.

It quickly went to #1 on Billboard's top singles chart

and became Elvis' first single to sell over a million copies.



By October of 1956, Elvis' 2nd album had outsold his
first by 200,000 and his singles had
sold over 10 million representing 2/3rds
of RCA's singles sales for the year.
He was a phenomenon.

 This exhibit explains a lot about the social controversy

over this man and his music.

One last picture from this exhibit which

I specifically asked for of Elvis in the sixties in the movie Charro.

I think it's great of him and shows a very different "look".

May have to get this movie on Red Box if I can and

see what it's like.

I learned Elvis was unhappy that they would never let him

do the dramatic roles he felt he could do

but kept him in the romantic comedy genre

in order to set him up to sing.

Cher has said that she learned a lot from his difficulties

and was able to avoid them for herself in moving into film

and yet staying in music.

Next we spent a few moments looking at the Lisa Marie and Hound Dog II Jets.

 The Lisa Maria flew him to all his concerts.

The Hound Dog II was used for his advance team.

All of the rooms in the Lisa Marie have their furniture covered

in plastic which isn't a problem if you are there but

makes it difficult to get good pictures.

This is the on plane dining table at which

Lisa Marie had her 9th birthday party.

Wonder how many little friends she had in attendance??

The on board bed in blue suede with a gold seat belt.

J

The interior of the Hound Dog is a tad more sedate

 

Next we saw the “Elvis Presley: Fashion King” Exhibit

This one was great fun. 

I've never really thought of Elvis as

a 'Fashion King' but they did

convince me that he was a trend setter.

According to the information here,

"Elvis' fashion style paralleled his music

which blended the styles of black rhythm & blues

with southern white gospel and country music.

Similarly, in the 1950's his appearance was a combination of

Southern African and white styles.

His clothing was purchased at stores such as

Lansky Brothers on Beale Street whose patrons

were mostly African American.

At a very young age Elvis began to turn up his collars

 and spend hours on his hair which was said to have been

influenced by his screen idol Tony Curtis.

In the mid-1950's, he laid the groundwork for

the rock n' roll rebel look that forever defined

the extreme of rock style."

The exhibit had a lot of pictures of him in

his clothing and a lot of the clothing itself.

It was all in glass cases which made reflection a serious problem in

taking pictures.

This jacket was my favorite.

And luckily for me one of the only ones

that turned out well enough to post.

Wish I'd seen him wear this.

The final exhibit was

“68’ Special”

which was a video interview with Priscilla Presley,

his wife at the time,

about the making of this important TV program
and his attention to every detail and his concern that it be perfect.

It was especially interesting because we'd just

seen the special the night before at the

Heartbreak Hotel.  I suggest you do that too.

Throughout the video exhibits

there were interviews with Elvis. 

He had a great sense of humor and a quick wit.

He handled ridiculous TV news reporter's questions with

sensitivity and humor.  He was a nice funny guy.

I had come mostly to pay homage to his music

and left wishing I'd actually known this
generous, thoughtful, humorous,
sexy, gorgeous, handsome, hunk-a-hunka
man.