In watching the movie and speaking to Hartal, it is hard not to come to the conclusion that there is something almost spiritual in the love that diehard Elvis fans have for their "king." "Elvis had a special neshama (soul)," says Hartal. "You don't see followers of John Lennon or Jim Morrison behaving the same way that Elvis fans do. There was something special beyond the man. His spirit, his music, his connection." The Presleys once lived in an apartment directly below the family of Rabbi Alfred Fruchter, the first principal of the Memphis Hebrew Academy. The rabbi’s son, Harold, who now lives in Maryland, said that Elvis actually served as the Fruchters’“Shabbos goy,” a non-Jew who performs household tasks for observant Jews that are normally forbidden on the Jewish Sabbath. Fruchter said his parents “never had even an inkling” that Elvis had Jewish roots. Dash, Mike (February 24, 2012). "Colonel Parker Managed Elvis' Career, but Was He a Killer on the Lam?". Smithsonian Magazine. Smithsonian Institution . Retrieved February 15, 2023. There are guitars, childhood photographs, old record albums, performance costumes and other memorabilia from Elvis’ illustrious career. https://www.jpost.com/diaspora/elvis-presley-was-jewish-a-grave-marker-confirms-it-after-four-decades-672005

But later, George heard that the family menorah had been found and was on display at the Elvis Presley Birthplace Museum. Indeed, much of the museum’s collection consists of gifts and mementos that Elvis had given Janelle over the years, which she donated to the museum. Afvaart 'SS Veendam' op 20-03-1926 vanaf haven New York". stadsarchief.rotterdam.nl. Rotterdam City Archive. Find sources: "Colonel Tom Parker"– news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR ( February 2020) ( Learn how and when to remove this template message)Presley had been showing signs of rebellion against Parker, and Parker believed that a stint in the Army would cure him of this. [36] Having sold over 500 million records worldwide, Presley is recognized as the best-selling solo music artist of all time by Guinness World Records. ( this is wrong) Gladys Presley’s grave marker, now on display at Graceland. It was designed by her famous son to honor the family’s Jewish heritage, a Graceland archivist says. (Dan Fellner via JTA) In 2018 Elvis’s mother’s headstone was taken out of storage and put on display in Graceland. The headstone was designed by Elvis himself after his mother died in 1958. He included a Star of David in the top left-hand corner. A sign next to the gravestone now says that was to honour Gladys’s Jewish heritage.

I spoke to the daughter of this rabbi. Her mother, the rabbi's wife, and Presley's mother, Gladys, were close friends. Gladys, her mother told her, never said a word about any Jewish ancestor. Her mother said that if Gladys had any knowledge of any Jewish ancestor, the mother was sure Gladys wouldn't have hesitated to mention it. My parents didn’t expect him to become famous,” Judy, Harold’s sister, said. “They thought he had a nice voice, but they didn’t think it was exceptional.”I’m a new Elvis fan, thanks to the pilgrimage I made to Graceland during Elvis Week last August, marking the anniversary of The King’s passing. The place was deserted due to Covid.

Billy Gardell in the CMT TV series Sun Records (2017). In this series Parker's connections with former clients Eddy Arnold and Hank Snow are also represented along with his management of Presley. On March 26, 1956, after Presley's management contract with Neal expired, Presley signed a contract with Parker that made him his exclusive representative. [26] Later, when Hank Snow asked Parker about the status of their contract with Presley, Parker told him: "You don't have any contract with Elvis Presley. Elvis is signed exclusively to the Colonel." [27] a b c Jobe Pierce, Patricia (1994). The Ultimate Elvis. Simon & Schuster Ltd. ISBN 978-0-671-87022-5. But her husband was far from convinced. “Dad was so upset by that,” Harold Fruchter remembered. “He said, ‘How could you think that Elvis’s music was anything like great cantorial music?’” In 1948, Parker received the honorary rank of colonel in the Louisiana State Militia from Jimmie Davis, the governor of Louisiana and a former country singer, in gratitude for Parker's work on Davis's election campaign. [18] The rank was honorary, since Louisiana had no organized militia, but Parker used the title throughout his life, becoming known simply as "the Colonel" to many acquaintances. [18]As I took the tour, the mystery deepened. After you visit the various rooms on the ground floor (the upstairs was off limits, I was told, as it was still occupied by Elvis’s two elderly aunts) you were sent to the basement to view an endless row of display cases with all of Elvis’s album covers, gold records, jumpsuits and more. The very last display case, before you left the building to roam the grounds, featured the things Elvis was wearing the night he died. Included were his religious paraphernalia, which he “always wore,” the docent told me: a cross and a Chai pendant (visible in the photo above). Beau Bridges in the TV film Elvis and the Colonel: The Untold Story (1993), alongside Rob Youngblood. What prompted Elvis to include the Star of David on his mother’s headstone? Marchese isn’t exactly sure, or even when Elvis learned of his mother’s Jewish heritage. But she says “the Jewish faith gave him comfort when he was seeking answers” to help him deal with her passing. PLEASE CHANGE TO Having sold over one billion records worldwide, Presley is recognized as the best-selling solo music artist of all time by Guinness World Records.