May 14, 2026 • 36 mins
Have you ever assaulted your hamburger guy? How do you handle your problematic pet chimpanzee? For a lot of us in the crowd, these questions sound ridiculous -- but for Elvis Presley, these conundrums were part of his everyday life. In the second episode of this special two-part series, returning guest Jordan Runtagh, co-creator of the hit podcast Too Much Information, takes the guys behind the scenes of Presley's pop stardom to explore his increasingly strange misadventures as his musical star rose... and his private life spun out into chaos.
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Ridiculous Histories, a production of iHeartRadio. Fellow Ridiculous Historians, thank you,
(00:28):
as always so much for tuning in. This is part
two of a two part series on the bizarre saga
of Elvis Presley. So with a shout out to our
super producer, mister Max Williams, you gotta listen to part one, folks.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
Oh you must. And now that you're done with that,
why don't you just dive on in headlong in media
arrests or in media three in two Part two.
Speaker 1 (01:00):
Did Elvis Presley h pay his entourage because it seems
like it was it was similar to what we would
later see with the entourages of say Little Wade or
most famously mc hammer.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
Whether they drew a salary or not, he supported their existence.
Speaker 1 (01:16):
Yeah, that's the question, Like did he pay them a
salary or were they just hangers on?
Speaker 3 (01:22):
They would on the payroll as it were, right, He
had a lot of cousins and step brothers and things
like extended family who absolutely were on some form of payroll.
I think there were other and and then other close
friends and stuff too. I think there were definitely people
that were more on the fringe that were just kind
of there for handouts and and got hangers on you.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
Yeah, yeah, what what's up with the Hamburger guy? Was
he part of Memphis Mafia?
Speaker 2 (01:48):
He was basically like the Snoop Dogg blunt Roller equivalent
or day or he was just there providing hamburger.
Speaker 1 (01:55):
I think it was uh Lil Wade. I met some
of his entourage and he had a guy called Snacks
and his job was just to get snacks for Wayne.
Speaker 2 (02:04):
And was this cat grilling them up to order? Was
he just going out and fetching hamburgers? Was other food involved?
Speaker 1 (02:11):
See hamburger cook or hamburger fetch.
Speaker 3 (02:14):
It's it's my it's my understanding that it was. He
was responsible for the production.
Speaker 4 (02:19):
Of the delivery s VP of Hamburgers. Okay, so this
man I actually don't know his real name. He was
only referred to as Hamburger James, and I have not
seen I have not seen his real name, which is
perhaps makes sense when you learn the second half of
this story. H Hamburger James's relationship with Elvis unraveled when
(02:41):
Elvis became convinced that Hamburger James had stolen both money
and private photos. Shall we say of his wife, Priscilla. Uh.
Speaker 3 (02:49):
And when Elvis learned of this, Elvis he had a temper.
He he learned of this when Hamburger James was about
to leave Memphis on a public airplane. And so Elvis,
you know, jetted to the Memphis airport. Somehow convinced the
airline to hold.
Speaker 1 (03:07):
Up the flight. He boarded the flight and walk for anybody, I.
Speaker 3 (03:13):
Mean yeah, no, and he somehow he finds this guy
on the plane. And this is an interview that Elvis's
stepbrother Rick Stanley, gave the People magazine in nineteen eighty nine.
I want to read this part because it's so it
really paints a picture. Okay, Elvis reaches over while Hamburger
James is looking straight at him, scared to death, and
(03:34):
slaps him twice like in the movies, a slap and
then a backhand pow and then pow again. Then the
most amazing thing happened. Hamburger James got a funny look
on his face and wilted like a baby. He cried
and cried like his heart was broken. He said he
was sorry he stole, and he would give it all back.
And he knew that he had done something that he
(03:55):
couldn't ever be forgiven for.
Speaker 1 (03:57):
Okay, Lesson learned a bit of a parable. Did he
continue to supply Hamburger's I.
Speaker 3 (04:03):
Don't think so. I mean, that's the thing. It's definitely
was like a you know, in the court of the
king kind of deal where people's favor rose and fill depends.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
But Elvis wasn't a vindictive guy right like he would.
Speaker 1 (04:14):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (04:15):
I mean, maybe i'm you know, oversimplifying, But did he
give Hamburger James another chance or did he cut him loose?
Speaker 3 (04:22):
You know that. I don't know. I don't think he did.
Speaker 2 (04:25):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (04:25):
Well, yeah, it's kind of one of those Crossby wants things,
as you said, an absolute monarchy. And he doesn't seem
vindictive necessarily. I don't want to sound like a jerk
with this. He sounds reactive and perhaps impulsive, but he
doesn't sound as though he has these spider like machinations
that take generations or years to come to fruition.
Speaker 2 (04:47):
Well, we certainly know that at the end of his
life his impulse control problems became quite apparent.
Speaker 1 (04:54):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (04:54):
And and She's Burgers also would play a role in
his demise. Sadly, I'm notlaughing. It's really quite tragic, you know.
And he was one of those people that was just
so surrounded by yes people and people that were taking
advantage of him. And at the end of his life
he literally was like held hostage by the colonel and
forced to be trotted out on stage like a dancing,
(05:15):
you know, circus animal. And he was not well and
people were not looking after him in that respect, and
he certainly wasn't looking after himself.
Speaker 1 (05:23):
They were definitely letting him eat some egregious things. That's
something that you know, we have to mention while we're
on airplanes and food, right gold low airplanes. Yes, the
fool's gold loaf, eight thousand calories per sandwich. All right,
describe it, GEORGI, you have to please.
Speaker 3 (05:42):
Okay, it's actually I believe I have. I want to.
I'll describe it, but I also need to describe it.
Speaker 2 (05:47):
Is this a regional delicacy? Why do you have to
fly to Denver.
Speaker 1 (05:50):
Colorado by the Colorado Mine Company? Yes?
Speaker 3 (05:54):
So, okay, you take a loaf of French white bread
and you bake it until golden brown.
Speaker 2 (06:00):
Like a baguette.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
So you're talking about why a little.
Speaker 3 (06:02):
Fluffier, a little fluffier and you hollow it out. You
take an entire jar of creamy peanut butter, an entire
jar of grape jam jelly, and then a pound of
fried bacon which is fried until crispy, and layer that
on top, put the top part of the bread on it,
and then they go. He'd bj and bacon in a
hollowed out loaf.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
Would you slice it to order?
Speaker 1 (06:25):
Or would.
Speaker 3 (06:27):
It's like a sub or like it's like you go
for the foot, Maybe you cut it in half, but
from what I've seen, it's like about a foot long.
Speaker 1 (06:35):
And so he would he beat. Elvis would fly with
his entourage and maybe for a time with his hamburger
guy James out to Denver.
Speaker 3 (06:46):
To sorry, man, I only do hamburgers, and my expertise
did slap it backslap.
Speaker 1 (06:53):
One?
Speaker 3 (06:53):
I think they were. Elvis famously didn't sleep like he
would just be up all night like he was kind
of a nocturnal guy.
Speaker 2 (06:59):
He was also one of those classic rock star stories
of like a pill to get up, a pill to
the mellow out, uppill to you know whatever, go to sleep.
You know. He was constantly on a cocktail of uppers, downers, booze,
and sandwiches.
Speaker 3 (07:15):
So he existed in this real twilight time of day.
So he in his entourage were hanging out at some
on godly hour, and he got a hanker and for
this fool's gold loaf, which as you said, was really
only obtainable, or at least the proper the official one
was only obtainable, and the Denver Mining Co Establishment in Denver.
And so they trek down the road to the little
(07:36):
airstrip where his private airplane was and they flew I believe,
I forget how many. I think it was like fifteen
of them or something out to Denver right on the spot,
went to the airplane hangar, thirty sandwiches were delivered, and
then they just crushed them with champagne and then flew
(07:56):
back to back to Emphis. And I crunched the numbers
on this. I believe those thirty sandwiches had a quarter
million calories in them.
Speaker 1 (08:06):
Wow, and they were they were what like fifty bucks
at pop back then.
Speaker 3 (08:11):
I know, well, in fact, you're in the cost of transport.
Speaker 1 (08:15):
Oh yeah, yeah, also the gas and the plane and
the pilot. And I get to ask this some more
abstract question for us, but do you think that Elvis
Presley was happy during this time. I know, it's a
tough one to call.
Speaker 3 (08:32):
I I mean there's two answers to that. He this
is gonna come out wrong, and I mean this in
the nicest way. He he enjoyed simple things and it
made him really happy. I mean he loved and he
was like he was a goofball. He loved like Monty Python,
he loved like Peter Sellers and the Pink Panther movies
and Slapstick like same. Well, yeah, exactly, like he kind
(08:53):
of like there was there's some things are awesome, yeah,
like you like go karts and stuff, and he would
rent out like amusements, big.
Speaker 1 (09:00):
Kid, right right.
Speaker 2 (09:01):
Yeah, he was almost at a state of arrested development.
I mean yeah, And he got to wonder if any
of that had to do with the loss of his
twin brother and the fact that his mother was such
a struggled with that loss throughout his childhood, and he
probably wanted to relive that childhood and have a brother
and have be surrounded by you know, brother like friends
(09:23):
kind of.
Speaker 3 (09:24):
I don't know, there's a lot of parallels between I
was gonna say, yeah with Michael Jackson, Yeah, which is
so weird that his Elvis's daughter, Lisa Marie married Michael Jackson,
and you know, and everybody was like, what, that's a
strange pairing, But in a way, it almost makes sense.
Speaker 1 (09:37):
He would she would be familiar with perhaps certain personality traits.
Speaker 2 (09:42):
Yeah. Yeah, But I.
Speaker 3 (09:46):
I think that his world was very He was not
in control, and I think he knew that, and so
he made his world when he wasn't forced to be
on stage very small. He really for the most of
the day life hours and most of the evening hours too,
he stayed in his the upstairs. The ground floor at
(10:06):
Graceland was like the communal party zone. There was the
media room, the pool room, there was you know, places
wherebody could hang out. But upstairs was famously extremely off limits,
and that.
Speaker 2 (10:16):
Was it was only for the family.
Speaker 3 (10:18):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (10:19):
They mentioned that in the episode of Paradise that I
was right.
Speaker 3 (10:21):
Yeah, I mean, like to this day, there's no photos
that have been taken up there since after he died,
and the ones that the few photos that do exist
up there are just like, you know, maybe half a
dozen of them. It was extremely private, and he had
his private quarters up there, and he mostly stayed up
there and watched movies in bed and hung out. He
(10:43):
had an office up there too, And but yeah, him
and Lisa Marie, or not Lisa Marie, he and his
wife Priscilla, and then later when when they left, he
had a few girlfriends, Linda Thompson and a few others.
They recall him mostly kind of keeping to himself up there,
I think because it was the only place he probably
(11:05):
felt in control. I think in there he was probably
happy because I don't think it took much to make
him happy. But I think feeling the responsibility he mentioned,
you know, the Memphis Mafia and all the people on
the payroll, he was very aware that he had a
small business to support just by being himself, and if
he didn't get out there and do it and hit
his marks, it would all stop. And it wasn't just
(11:25):
people depending on him, it was family depending on him.
Speaker 1 (11:28):
Yeah, that's a great point. Also, one other point you
hit there, Jordan, that might be familiar to a lot
of folks in the audience is when you're at that
level of the public, public imagery, or being a public figure,
one of the most precious and finite resources you will
ever have is solitude. Is just being alone so I
(11:51):
could totally see him, you know, I could see him
kicking it in front of the TV with a banana,
peanut butter or sandwich and watch and seeing the phone ring,
and then just turning up the television just for like
a night, right, just to get away. There's something scary
(12:12):
about that, because again I think the Michael Jackson Elvis
Presley comparison is spot on. I was not aware until
we started looking at some of your research together that
just like Michael Jackson, Elvis Presley bonded with another primate.
Could you tell us a little bit about what's this
(12:34):
guy's name? Scattered? Scattered? Scatter? Okay, this is a true story.
Speaker 3 (12:45):
This is a true story, and a pet champanzee named
Scatter who reportedly drank alcohol, destroyed hotel rooms, bit unsuspecting people.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
So that's our Keith Moon, Yeah right, yes.
Speaker 3 (12:56):
And he also had a habit of yanking down women's skirts,
which with sure Elvis was was charmed by.
Speaker 1 (13:02):
H fit right in.
Speaker 3 (13:03):
But Elvis is you know, the Memphis Mafia, and Scatter
he would he would announce himself with an ear splitting
woo whenever he walked into rooms, and he would just
terrorize visitors with these unpredictable, violent outbursts. And probably the
most famous incident was Scattered was when he escaped and
found his way into he was. I guess it was
(13:25):
in Elvis's movie period in the sixties when he was
making a lot of movies in Hollywood, and he wandered
into the office of legendary film producer Samuel Goldwyn at
MGM and.
Speaker 1 (13:35):
Just tore the office apart.
Speaker 3 (13:37):
That's like wandering into like Steven Spielberg's office like that insane,
like of all the rooms to and I guess security
interviewed and escorted him out. But yeah, Elvis, he treated
him less like a pet and more like a mischievous roommate.
Speaker 1 (13:51):
He referred to him here, I don't know, I love
this so much.
Speaker 3 (13:54):
He referred to him as a quote coconut headed little
motherfucker since which is beautiful. And but nobody else at
the house. Both the entourage and the staff of Graceland
appreciated Scatters antics uh. Everybody else hated him, yes, and
they eventually they banished him to the outside. Elvis had
(14:16):
to build a special little climate controlled building where Scatter
was kept. And Elvis he loved hanging out with him.
He liked to dress Elvis. He Elvis liked to dress
the chimp in human style outfits, and then he like
he had you, would do this prank where he would
stop at traffic lights and duck and make it appear
that Scattered the monkey was driving this car by himself,
(14:37):
and he just thought it was. He was endlessly entertained
by this.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
But make me think of that that Monkey Trucker movie.
Every which way at least with that. Yeah, yeah, there's
a golden time for pet primates and weird Michael Jackson,
also primate owner.
Speaker 3 (14:57):
You're right, though, this staff really did not like Scatter,
and Scatter's life ended under mysterious circumstances. According to multiple
stories from Elvis insiders, there's a belief that the chimp
was poisoned after biting a Graceland made.
Speaker 1 (15:14):
Oh another conspiracy.
Speaker 3 (15:18):
Elvis's cousin Billy Smith, later said, we always thought she
poisoned him, and it wouldn't surprise me because not long
after that, after this attack, the monkey came up dead.
Speaker 1 (15:27):
And we've got oh man, we've got to also talk
about the high drama that Elvis, Elvis almost got involved
with the man himself is now known as being a
phenomenal pop icon. But Jordan, as you were telling us
earlier off air, Elvis Presley almost became a star of
(15:51):
musicals as well.
Speaker 2 (15:53):
Yeah, he a lot of.
Speaker 3 (15:55):
Film projects got filtered through the Colonel, and the Colonel,
as we said earlier, had questionable taste. And they initially
went to Elvis to play the role of Tony in
West Side Story, and they ended up turning it down.
And then years later Barbara streisand really really wanted him
(16:16):
to be the lead in her version of A Star.
Speaker 1 (16:18):
Is Born Barbara streisand yeah, of Yentl.
Speaker 3 (16:23):
The one and only, And yeah, once again, I think
he was just sort of talked out of doing it.
Speaker 1 (16:30):
By the Colonel, who was a baby Wow. Okay, so
we know that he could have been in more better movies.
Speaker 3 (16:39):
He was in thirty one movies. And they're all bad.
Speaker 1 (16:41):
Okay, wait, wait, wait, what's the worst one in your opinion?
In your opinion and we will quote this later.
Speaker 3 (16:48):
I mean I haven't seen them all because I'm not
that much of a masochist. I mean this one called
Kissing Cousins, which is pretty bad.
Speaker 1 (16:55):
Wait, thirty one and they're seriously, they're all clunkers.
Speaker 3 (16:59):
Some of the early one's like King Creole's okay, Blue
Hawaii's okay. There's one where he's a race car driver,
which like kind of sucks. Let's see one called clam Bake,
which is really I mean just the names alone. Let's
sell the one where Elvis he there's one called I
think it's called Stay Away Joe where he plays a
(17:20):
Navajo man in brown face. That's pretty bad.
Speaker 1 (17:23):
Oh dear, that's great. That's not great, Elvis. We also
we can dispel one common myth about Elvis while we're
while we're looking into this stuff.
Speaker 2 (17:35):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (17:35):
Similar to characters like Abraham Lincoln, Elvis has often been
alleged to be a malungeon. Uh. And that's just something
that's a trib racial isolate out at Tennessee, and it's
something that pops up inevitably when people talk about his genealogy.
But as we know, there's not really any proof of that, right, Jordan,
(17:58):
I'm not that I'm aware of. Oh okay, okay, just
dispelling that one while we're while we're on the way.
We've got to get talked about the cars eventually, but
before we do eddy of that, we should emphasize that
Elvis also saw himself as a fan of law and order.
Despite his chaotic shenanigans, he really wanted to work for
(18:21):
the feds, right, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (18:22):
He he had like an almost childlike interest in like
law enforcement, and because he liked the badges. Like like
when I was a kid, I wanted to join boy Scouts,
not because I gave a shit about like camping, but
because I like the uniform. That's basically Elvis's whole take
on cops. Like he loved cops. Wherever he went. He
would like, you know, the security guards and stuff. He
(18:45):
would talk to them. He would give you know, all
the cops in Memphis, like huge bonuses every year, and
he made a habit of like collecting just badges from
different police precincts whenever he was on tour and this
this hobby eats.
Speaker 1 (19:03):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (19:04):
He was a really blue Lives Matter kind of kid.
Speaker 1 (19:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (19:07):
Yeah, but it came from definitely like a like, oh
they were the good guys, like kind of right, that's
what I'm melistic.
Speaker 1 (19:14):
Yeah, it was a law enforcement yea.
Speaker 2 (19:16):
Yeah, No, I'm only bringing that up as a as
a more you know, modern touch point for that kind
of thing. But he certainly wasn't about a pression or
any kind of negative aspects of law enforcement. He just
he just thought the policemen were like like eternal.
Speaker 1 (19:33):
Career day kid getting excited when the fire truck comes
to the school, yes, right, clapping his hands.
Speaker 3 (19:39):
Yeah, And so this this kind of escalated to you know,
it's a logical conclusion. By in nineteen seventy when he
met then President Richard Nixon in the Oval Office and H. L.
Nixon gave him a sort of semi fictitious narcotics badge.
Speaker 2 (20:01):
That's what I'm thinking. Yeah, I remember that that was
sort of a bit of a pr stunt.
Speaker 3 (20:06):
Oh, but it is the most requested image in the
National Archives. Did you know that of Elvis and Nixon
shaking hands. It is one of the most sere I mean,
I understandably, so it's one of the most surreal images
I've ever seen. And Elvis took the opportunity, which always
made me really sad as a Beatles fan, to he
talks to Nixon about, you know, you got to do
something about those Beatles. They're bad for the American youth.
(20:28):
They're taking drugs and which well when when those because
you know, Nixon quite famously had everything in the Oval
office taped, and when those tapes came out and the
Beatles heard it, they were really hurt because they were
huge Elvis fans. But uh, yeah, there was a movie
made a couple of years ago with Michael Shannon as
(20:48):
Elvis and I forget who played Nixon. But about this
truly bizarre meeting at the White.
Speaker 1 (20:53):
House, right, Yeah, it's like a mockumentary style. Yeah, correct, Yeah,
I think a lot of us have been fascinated by
the Elvis meets Nixon's story. Like you said, I did
not know it was the most requested image in the archives,
but it seems like it's his I Love your Boy
Scout comparison, because it seems like it's the ultimate merit
(21:15):
badge for him. He wanted to be the he wanted
to be in the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs,
but he didn't really seem to understand what that meant.
Speaker 3 (21:26):
Yeah or maybe yeah, maybe he just thought that he
could get free drugs from doing that.
Speaker 2 (21:30):
I don't know.
Speaker 3 (21:31):
I yeah, it was truly a.
Speaker 2 (21:33):
That is kind of funny. How hot for law enforcement.
He was considering what an illicit drug user he was.
Speaker 1 (21:41):
I'm just I'm looking at this great Smithsonian article from
a while back by the journalist Peter Carlson, who who
outlines sort of the the way the meeting came together
and the idea that Priscilla Presley in her memoir Elvis
and Me says, Elvis thought that if he got this
(22:03):
titular badge, he could legally enter any country with guns
and carrying any drugs he wished.
Speaker 2 (22:11):
I didn't realize that immunity.
Speaker 1 (22:14):
I did not know that was part of the rational
abstracted you know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
That's hilarious. That makes a lot of sense. Honest, I
would have thought that his naivety would have stood in
the way making that kind of connection.
Speaker 1 (22:30):
So that's it's bizarre. But it is also, I think
telling that the president of the United States at that
point in history, the most dangerous guy on the planet,
was was like, oh, well, I don't work for the
good of marriage. What what do we got? What we
what do we got? And we could give this one.
(22:57):
I don't know if we still have musicians who were
at that level of impact right or of influence, but.
Speaker 2 (23:09):
Well, we certainly have heard stories of even like Snoop
Dogg getting in trouble for having weed in the netherwise,
you know, I mean, like definitely, yeah, I couldn't. I
couldn't name one. I mean, he's about as big of
a star as they come.
Speaker 1 (23:20):
Snoo I didn't have the badge.
Speaker 2 (23:22):
He didn't have the badge, that's true. I would love
to pivot really quickly to a piece of news that
came out recently that we actually talked about on our
sister show Stuff They Don't Want you to Know. Elvis
in the seventies had this dude named Jay Orberg customize
a Cadillac for him to make it look like a
(23:42):
giant rolling guitar and the most non functional, kind of
absurd sort of custom job you could imagine, and that
has recently made its way back to the States in
Desertland Park, Orlando. It's going to under that unveil the
car recently for public consumption or for public viewing before
(24:06):
undertaking a massive restoration project that guests are going to
be able to actually watch unfold inside of the Orlando
Auto Museum. Do you know about this? This bizarre vehicle
looks more like a parade float than a car you drive.
Speaker 3 (24:20):
I didn't until just this moment and I just googled
it and it's forty one feet walls its.
Speaker 1 (24:28):
World is this? This is crazy?
Speaker 3 (24:31):
I know, how how would you drive this?
Speaker 2 (24:34):
Because guess the thing? Yeah, it's it's it's literally something
I think he would drive around Graceland like as a like,
look at me kind of situation. But I don't know
that it was particularly practical to take, you know, to
take on road trips. But it is valued currently, even
in its current state, at more than two hundred million
(24:54):
dollars in this company. Yeah, this museum. I think it's
the most valuable piece in their collection that includes cars
from like James Bond films and Batman and like you
know film franchises like The Fast and the Furious.
Speaker 3 (25:09):
That's wild. I mean, if for no other reason that
I don't know it as being a particularly special part
of Elvis lore. I mean because he's you know, the
whole pink Cadillac thing is.
Speaker 1 (25:21):
A big part of his shooting cars.
Speaker 3 (25:23):
Shooting cars. Yeah, there's a story where he was having
a fight with his girlfriend at the time, Linda Thompson,
and he wanted to get in his car and dramatically
like peel out but it's stalled out in the out
of her and he was so mad that he just
shot the car.
Speaker 1 (25:39):
That reminds me of Mitch Hedberg's joke where he got
mad at his girlfriend while they were camping. He was
in a tent and he was trying to figure out
how to zip it up angrily, you know what I mean.
So eventually, Okay, So Elvis, who was always strapped apparently
like Danny DeVito and always Sonny, he made to shoot
(26:02):
his car. He never he never got arrested for any
firearm related offenses that I don't believe.
Speaker 3 (26:10):
I know Elvis in cars, he had a special relationship
with cars he bought. I believe in the Graceland records
they indicate that he purchased over two hundred of them
in his lifetime, and he gave most of them away
because I think for him it was the ultimate status symbol.
And there was a story it's really kind of sad,
(26:30):
like he was a truck driver in Tupelo, Mississippi, and
he'd pass all these shiny cars when he was driving
these big rigs, and he would, you know, dream about getting,
you know, a nice car. And when he first got
a little bit of money when he was on Sun
Records prior to going to RCA. When he was first
starting out, one of the first big purchase he made
was his car, and it was was secondhand, but he
(26:52):
really loved it, and he parked it outside of the
hotel he was in when he was on tour and
he just stared at it all night. He loved this thing.
And then the next caught fire and burned up on
the road.
Speaker 2 (27:02):
Oh that's terrible.
Speaker 3 (27:03):
And he later said, I got a lot of cars,
when none will ever take the place of that first one.
Speaker 1 (27:07):
Which of the one car you can't get despite the
amount of money you have.
Speaker 2 (27:11):
Yeah, well yeah, And as we're wrapping up, I'd love
to kind of maybe go back to his roots and
then trace back to his end, the end of his life.
You know, he he did grow up in poverty, He
did grow up around all these incredible black musicians that
he was influenced by. He got his first guitar as
a gift when he was very very young, and he
(27:37):
didn't pass away with a particularly high net worth, which
is interesting considering all of the stuff that you're talking about,
all the spending behavior, which is also very similar to
Michael Jackson's story. He was a voracious spender and he
died passed away in nineteen seventy seven with a net
worth only around five million dollars. And that was because
(27:59):
the eight was considered mega mega cash poor. It was
falling apart. He made all these really bad deals, specifically
and unfavorable fifty percent commission deal with the Colonel who
we've been talking about all this time, really really nuts normal, Yeah, yeah,
fifty percent, that's unheard of. With inflation adjustment, that would
(28:20):
put him in around twenty to twenty seven million in
today's standards. But this guy is like legendary, I mean,
probably one of the most famous musicians to ever live.
That's just seems absurd, unheard of to have to pass
away with that little And apparently a lot of it
too had to do with the fact that the estate
was crumbling physically and they were paying incredibly high taxes,
(28:43):
over seventy percent of the value going towards all these
taxes and fees. However, Priscilla did turn it around and
turn it into Graceland that we know and you know,
quite a popular attraction, and that was that a necessity.
Speaker 1 (28:58):
I mean, they were going to lose that necessity.
Speaker 3 (29:00):
It was their family home and they're still at certain
times a year, I think around Christmas, and they take
the plexiglass down, they take the vevelt ropes down, and
it becomes a family home again. And that's like and
the one spot and this has always fascinated me. The
downstairs museum, you know great tours, That was the public
part of the house where when Elvis was alive, that
(29:21):
was where people would hang out. The upstairs is.
Speaker 1 (29:24):
Like a bank vault.
Speaker 4 (29:26):
No one like.
Speaker 3 (29:27):
It's truly like a really wonka like nobody ever goes in,
nobody ever goes out. And the story that the curators
say is that it is left exactly as it was
the day Elvis died. There's a styrofoam cup on a
counter where he left it. The record on his turntable
in his bedroom is the one he was listening to
when he died.
Speaker 2 (29:45):
Is truly.
Speaker 1 (29:47):
I wonder if they left any of his guns there.
Oh I'm sure no. Really, they go clean it.
Speaker 3 (29:53):
And like the chalk in the pool table, like in
the little draw on the pool table, is the chalk
that was there when Elvis was live. They they were
cleaning some credenza or something in the jungle room. And
I want to say they found like a knife or something,
they found something strange in there, and they put it back.
Speaker 4 (30:11):
You know.
Speaker 3 (30:11):
Yeah, everything is left truly untouched. And they're like, no
one is allowed up there. They've had visiting dignitaries, they've
had presidents, they've had you know, foreign leaders, and of
course everyone wants to see, you know, Elvis's private course.
Nobody is allowed up that. The only person who was
not a member of Elvis's immediate family who did was
Nicholas Cage, who took the novel approach of marrying Lisa
(30:33):
Marie Presley few thousands and so he apparently went up
there and tried on one of Elvis's leather jackets and
sat at Elvis's bed.
Speaker 2 (30:41):
Yeah, and it served as a symbol of his individuality
and his belief in personal freedom. Danny wild at heart
fans out there, that's what's yeah, Marry Elvis Codd in
that movie clearly was a big fan of the guy.
Speaker 1 (30:52):
And this guy, Elvis Presley, lived such a life. He
did more in his forty two years than any other
people would do in one hundred or ninety one, depending
on what Elvis is up to today bringing that conspiracy back.
Speaker 3 (31:07):
Maybe that's why they don't allow anyone up there. Maybe
he's still up there watching money Python and yeah, we've
got gold loaves.
Speaker 1 (31:14):
We've got to follow the money. We've got to do
the numbers on the Colorado Mind Company and see how
their orders are spiking on Fool's Loaf.
Speaker 2 (31:22):
And I mentioned the use of Graceland as a kind
of set piece in this series Paradise. I want to
spoil anything about the show, but all of the things
that you're talking about, ben those questions that you're asking about,
were their guns still remaining in the house, that record
still on the record player, the off limits upstairs, the cars,
all of those things play into it because if you
(31:42):
think about it's kind of a genius plot device, like
think of roving marauders and all of a sudden coming
upon this house that's left in the state you know
that it was when the man died, and all this
have this absolute fleet of crazy cars that they could,
you know, hijack. It's very very cool the way it's used.
Speaker 1 (32:01):
Yeah, because now we have seen a musician rise from
humble origins in Tupelo to become a global symbol like
more than a man. This is now a stand in
or atonomy for the idea of American culture in general.
The guns play a huge part of that. Just I
think we forgot to mention he bought guns as presents
(32:25):
for people all the time. In nineteen seventy alone, he
bought more than thirty two guns just to give out,
maybe to his mafia buddies, maybe to people he saw
on the street, maybe at a show. And get this,
I we forgot to mention this. When he had his
interactions with President Richard Nixon in nineteen seventy, he gave
(32:49):
Nixon a forty five as a president, which I don't
I didn't know you could do that with presidents. That
seems like a threat.
Speaker 2 (32:57):
Wasn't this also like sort of when I was mentioning
the pr stunt of all of that in that photo op,
wasn't that Nixon kind of trying to like look cool
and like be like kind of like I'm hip, I'm
with it. I get what the youth are into. But
by that point Elvis wasn't cool with the youth. He
was such a symbol of like the old guard and
like the square set and like the kind of music
your parents would have been into.
Speaker 3 (33:17):
Yeah, Elvis definitely had his own reasons for agreeing to
all this. Yeah, No, there was something that it was
definitely because this was the era I think when he
when Nixon went out to the to the mall and
started talking to like anti war protesters at like four
in the morning, and like he was in a bad way.
Nixon was in this era trying to desperately recover the
(33:42):
cool factor that he never.
Speaker 1 (33:43):
Had, exactly, Yeah, searching for something he didn't have. What
we had here is a phenomenal time. I don't know
about everybody else, but even from being from Tennessee, I've
learned a lot of stuff about mister Presley that I
did not know. And Jordan, we cannot thank you enough
for joining us on this special two part series about
(34:05):
Elvis Presley. Dude, where can people learn more about you?
Where can they learn more about your work?
Speaker 3 (34:11):
Oh? Man, Well let's see follow me on Twitter and
uh yeah, give a listen to post most of the
shows I'm working on there, and yeah, give a listen
to too much information that's more. If you like this
kind of you know, grab bag of facts from my
hoarder's attic of a mind, of trivia facts. Go there.
Speaker 2 (34:30):
I think you'll enjoy that credible two parter, maybe even
four partner. Jordan on the type the history of the
movie Titanic.
Speaker 3 (34:37):
Oh, yes, that was It is twice as long as
the three hour movie, So strap in, folks.
Speaker 1 (34:44):
Also also another thing we forgot to bit you on here, Jordan.
One of the most fun parts about researching this, as
with so many other topics and music history, is that
I would I would run into a sort and I
would think, huh, this is pretty good, and then I
would see it said something like People magazine. I would
(35:05):
go hang on, wait a second, and you wrote it.
You wrote the stuff I was looking up thinking Jordan
might think this is interesting.
Speaker 2 (35:13):
Oh, that's so funny.
Speaker 3 (35:15):
Oh man, that's nice to hear.
Speaker 1 (35:17):
Well, Jordan, thank you so much for joining us. We
can't wait to have you on in the future for
more strange music history and perhaps a deep dive at
the Titanic. Oh. That wording was rough and accidental, but
we'll keep it. Yeah, we'll keep it. Shout out to
Cameron Big Big thanks to our super producer mister Max Williams.
Big thanks to our composer Alex Williams. Nol who else,
(35:39):
who else, who else?
Speaker 2 (35:40):
Well, of course Alex Williams, who composed of this theme,
Jonathan Strickland, the Quizzer, A J. Bahamas, Jacobs, the Puzzler,
Big Big.
Speaker 1 (35:47):
Thanks to Rachel Doctor Big Spinach Lance even Bigger, Huger
Foolslow thanks to the Room Dudes of Ridiculous Crime. If
you dig us, you will love them. That's it for today, folks.
Tune in next week. We're getting even weirder with it.
Speaker 3 (36:03):
We'll see you next time, folks.
Speaker 2 (36:11):
For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Ridiculous Histories, a production of iHeartRadio. Fellow Ridiculous Historians, thank you,
(00:28):
as always so much for tuning in. This is part
two of a two part series on the bizarre saga
of Elvis Presley. So with a shout out to our
super producer, mister Max Williams, you gotta listen to part one, folks.
Speaker 2 (00:45):
Oh you must. And now that you're done with that,
why don't you just dive on in headlong in media
arrests or in media three in two Part two.
Speaker 1 (01:00):
Did Elvis Presley h pay his entourage because it seems
like it was it was similar to what we would
later see with the entourages of say Little Wade or
most famously mc hammer.
Speaker 2 (01:12):
Whether they drew a salary or not, he supported their existence.
Speaker 1 (01:16):
Yeah, that's the question, Like did he pay them a
salary or were they just hangers on?
Speaker 3 (01:22):
They would on the payroll as it were, right, He
had a lot of cousins and step brothers and things
like extended family who absolutely were on some form of payroll.
I think there were other and and then other close
friends and stuff too. I think there were definitely people
that were more on the fringe that were just kind
of there for handouts and and got hangers on you.
Speaker 1 (01:42):
Yeah, yeah, what what's up with the Hamburger guy? Was
he part of Memphis Mafia?
Speaker 2 (01:48):
He was basically like the Snoop Dogg blunt Roller equivalent
or day or he was just there providing hamburger.
Speaker 1 (01:55):
I think it was uh Lil Wade. I met some
of his entourage and he had a guy called Snacks
and his job was just to get snacks for Wayne.
Speaker 2 (02:04):
And was this cat grilling them up to order? Was
he just going out and fetching hamburgers? Was other food involved?
Speaker 1 (02:11):
See hamburger cook or hamburger fetch.
Speaker 3 (02:14):
It's it's my it's my understanding that it was. He
was responsible for the production.
Speaker 4 (02:19):
Of the delivery s VP of Hamburgers. Okay, so this
man I actually don't know his real name. He was
only referred to as Hamburger James, and I have not
seen I have not seen his real name, which is
perhaps makes sense when you learn the second half of
this story. H Hamburger James's relationship with Elvis unraveled when
(02:41):
Elvis became convinced that Hamburger James had stolen both money
and private photos. Shall we say of his wife, Priscilla. Uh.
Speaker 3 (02:49):
And when Elvis learned of this, Elvis he had a temper.
He he learned of this when Hamburger James was about
to leave Memphis on a public airplane. And so Elvis,
you know, jetted to the Memphis airport. Somehow convinced the
airline to hold.
Speaker 1 (03:07):
Up the flight. He boarded the flight and walk for anybody, I.
Speaker 3 (03:13):
Mean yeah, no, and he somehow he finds this guy
on the plane. And this is an interview that Elvis's
stepbrother Rick Stanley, gave the People magazine in nineteen eighty nine.
I want to read this part because it's so it
really paints a picture. Okay, Elvis reaches over while Hamburger
James is looking straight at him, scared to death, and
(03:34):
slaps him twice like in the movies, a slap and
then a backhand pow and then pow again. Then the
most amazing thing happened. Hamburger James got a funny look
on his face and wilted like a baby. He cried
and cried like his heart was broken. He said he
was sorry he stole, and he would give it all back.
And he knew that he had done something that he
(03:55):
couldn't ever be forgiven for.
Speaker 1 (03:57):
Okay, Lesson learned a bit of a parable. Did he
continue to supply Hamburger's I.
Speaker 3 (04:03):
Don't think so. I mean, that's the thing. It's definitely
was like a you know, in the court of the
king kind of deal where people's favor rose and fill depends.
Speaker 2 (04:11):
But Elvis wasn't a vindictive guy right like he would.
Speaker 1 (04:14):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (04:15):
I mean, maybe i'm you know, oversimplifying, But did he
give Hamburger James another chance or did he cut him loose?
Speaker 3 (04:22):
You know that. I don't know. I don't think he did.
Speaker 2 (04:25):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (04:25):
Well, yeah, it's kind of one of those Crossby wants things,
as you said, an absolute monarchy. And he doesn't seem
vindictive necessarily. I don't want to sound like a jerk
with this. He sounds reactive and perhaps impulsive, but he
doesn't sound as though he has these spider like machinations
that take generations or years to come to fruition.
Speaker 2 (04:47):
Well, we certainly know that at the end of his
life his impulse control problems became quite apparent.
Speaker 1 (04:54):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (04:54):
And and She's Burgers also would play a role in
his demise. Sadly, I'm notlaughing. It's really quite tragic, you know.
And he was one of those people that was just
so surrounded by yes people and people that were taking
advantage of him. And at the end of his life
he literally was like held hostage by the colonel and
forced to be trotted out on stage like a dancing,
(05:15):
you know, circus animal. And he was not well and
people were not looking after him in that respect, and
he certainly wasn't looking after himself.
Speaker 1 (05:23):
They were definitely letting him eat some egregious things. That's
something that you know, we have to mention while we're
on airplanes and food, right gold low airplanes. Yes, the
fool's gold loaf, eight thousand calories per sandwich. All right,
describe it, GEORGI, you have to please.
Speaker 3 (05:42):
Okay, it's actually I believe I have. I want to.
I'll describe it, but I also need to describe it.
Speaker 2 (05:47):
Is this a regional delicacy? Why do you have to
fly to Denver.
Speaker 1 (05:50):
Colorado by the Colorado Mine Company? Yes?
Speaker 3 (05:54):
So, okay, you take a loaf of French white bread
and you bake it until golden brown.
Speaker 2 (06:00):
Like a baguette.
Speaker 1 (06:00):
So you're talking about why a little.
Speaker 3 (06:02):
Fluffier, a little fluffier and you hollow it out. You
take an entire jar of creamy peanut butter, an entire
jar of grape jam jelly, and then a pound of
fried bacon which is fried until crispy, and layer that
on top, put the top part of the bread on it,
and then they go. He'd bj and bacon in a
hollowed out loaf.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
Would you slice it to order?
Speaker 1 (06:25):
Or would.
Speaker 3 (06:27):
It's like a sub or like it's like you go
for the foot, Maybe you cut it in half, but
from what I've seen, it's like about a foot long.
Speaker 1 (06:35):
And so he would he beat. Elvis would fly with
his entourage and maybe for a time with his hamburger
guy James out to Denver.
Speaker 3 (06:46):
To sorry, man, I only do hamburgers, and my expertise
did slap it backslap.
Speaker 1 (06:53):
One?
Speaker 3 (06:53):
I think they were. Elvis famously didn't sleep like he
would just be up all night like he was kind
of a nocturnal guy.
Speaker 2 (06:59):
He was also one of those classic rock star stories
of like a pill to get up, a pill to
the mellow out, uppill to you know whatever, go to sleep.
You know. He was constantly on a cocktail of uppers, downers, booze,
and sandwiches.
Speaker 3 (07:15):
So he existed in this real twilight time of day.
So he in his entourage were hanging out at some
on godly hour, and he got a hanker and for
this fool's gold loaf, which as you said, was really
only obtainable, or at least the proper the official one
was only obtainable, and the Denver Mining Co Establishment in Denver.
And so they trek down the road to the little
(07:36):
airstrip where his private airplane was and they flew I believe,
I forget how many. I think it was like fifteen
of them or something out to Denver right on the spot,
went to the airplane hangar, thirty sandwiches were delivered, and
then they just crushed them with champagne and then flew
(07:56):
back to back to Emphis. And I crunched the numbers
on this. I believe those thirty sandwiches had a quarter
million calories in them.
Speaker 1 (08:06):
Wow, and they were they were what like fifty bucks
at pop back then.
Speaker 3 (08:11):
I know, well, in fact, you're in the cost of transport.
Speaker 1 (08:15):
Oh yeah, yeah, also the gas and the plane and
the pilot. And I get to ask this some more
abstract question for us, but do you think that Elvis
Presley was happy during this time. I know, it's a
tough one to call.
Speaker 3 (08:32):
I I mean there's two answers to that. He this
is gonna come out wrong, and I mean this in
the nicest way. He he enjoyed simple things and it
made him really happy. I mean he loved and he
was like he was a goofball. He loved like Monty Python,
he loved like Peter Sellers and the Pink Panther movies
and Slapstick like same. Well, yeah, exactly, like he kind
(08:53):
of like there was there's some things are awesome, yeah,
like you like go karts and stuff, and he would
rent out like amusements, big.
Speaker 1 (09:00):
Kid, right right.
Speaker 2 (09:01):
Yeah, he was almost at a state of arrested development.
I mean yeah, And he got to wonder if any
of that had to do with the loss of his
twin brother and the fact that his mother was such
a struggled with that loss throughout his childhood, and he
probably wanted to relive that childhood and have a brother
and have be surrounded by you know, brother like friends
(09:23):
kind of.
Speaker 3 (09:24):
I don't know, there's a lot of parallels between I
was gonna say, yeah with Michael Jackson, Yeah, which is
so weird that his Elvis's daughter, Lisa Marie married Michael Jackson,
and you know, and everybody was like, what, that's a
strange pairing, But in a way, it almost makes sense.
Speaker 1 (09:37):
He would she would be familiar with perhaps certain personality traits.
Speaker 2 (09:42):
Yeah. Yeah, But I.
Speaker 3 (09:46):
I think that his world was very He was not
in control, and I think he knew that, and so
he made his world when he wasn't forced to be
on stage very small. He really for the most of
the day life hours and most of the evening hours too,
he stayed in his the upstairs. The ground floor at
(10:06):
Graceland was like the communal party zone. There was the
media room, the pool room, there was you know, places
wherebody could hang out. But upstairs was famously extremely off limits,
and that.
Speaker 2 (10:16):
Was it was only for the family.
Speaker 3 (10:18):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (10:19):
They mentioned that in the episode of Paradise that I
was right.
Speaker 3 (10:21):
Yeah, I mean, like to this day, there's no photos
that have been taken up there since after he died,
and the ones that the few photos that do exist
up there are just like, you know, maybe half a
dozen of them. It was extremely private, and he had
his private quarters up there, and he mostly stayed up
there and watched movies in bed and hung out. He
(10:43):
had an office up there too, And but yeah, him
and Lisa Marie, or not Lisa Marie, he and his
wife Priscilla, and then later when when they left, he
had a few girlfriends, Linda Thompson and a few others.
They recall him mostly kind of keeping to himself up there,
I think because it was the only place he probably
(11:05):
felt in control. I think in there he was probably
happy because I don't think it took much to make
him happy. But I think feeling the responsibility he mentioned,
you know, the Memphis Mafia and all the people on
the payroll, he was very aware that he had a
small business to support just by being himself, and if
he didn't get out there and do it and hit
his marks, it would all stop. And it wasn't just
(11:25):
people depending on him, it was family depending on him.
Speaker 1 (11:28):
Yeah, that's a great point. Also, one other point you
hit there, Jordan, that might be familiar to a lot
of folks in the audience is when you're at that
level of the public, public imagery, or being a public figure,
one of the most precious and finite resources you will
ever have is solitude. Is just being alone so I
(11:51):
could totally see him, you know, I could see him
kicking it in front of the TV with a banana,
peanut butter or sandwich and watch and seeing the phone ring,
and then just turning up the television just for like
a night, right, just to get away. There's something scary
(12:12):
about that, because again I think the Michael Jackson Elvis
Presley comparison is spot on. I was not aware until
we started looking at some of your research together that
just like Michael Jackson, Elvis Presley bonded with another primate.
Could you tell us a little bit about what's this
(12:34):
guy's name? Scattered? Scattered? Scatter? Okay, this is a true story.
Speaker 3 (12:45):
This is a true story, and a pet champanzee named
Scatter who reportedly drank alcohol, destroyed hotel rooms, bit unsuspecting people.
Speaker 1 (12:54):
So that's our Keith Moon, Yeah right, yes.
Speaker 3 (12:56):
And he also had a habit of yanking down women's skirts,
which with sure Elvis was was charmed by.
Speaker 1 (13:02):
H fit right in.
Speaker 3 (13:03):
But Elvis is you know, the Memphis Mafia, and Scatter
he would he would announce himself with an ear splitting
woo whenever he walked into rooms, and he would just
terrorize visitors with these unpredictable, violent outbursts. And probably the
most famous incident was Scattered was when he escaped and
found his way into he was. I guess it was
(13:25):
in Elvis's movie period in the sixties when he was
making a lot of movies in Hollywood, and he wandered
into the office of legendary film producer Samuel Goldwyn at
MGM and.
Speaker 1 (13:35):
Just tore the office apart.
Speaker 3 (13:37):
That's like wandering into like Steven Spielberg's office like that insane,
like of all the rooms to and I guess security
interviewed and escorted him out. But yeah, Elvis, he treated
him less like a pet and more like a mischievous roommate.
Speaker 1 (13:51):
He referred to him here, I don't know, I love
this so much.
Speaker 3 (13:54):
He referred to him as a quote coconut headed little
motherfucker since which is beautiful. And but nobody else at
the house. Both the entourage and the staff of Graceland
appreciated Scatters antics uh. Everybody else hated him, yes, and
they eventually they banished him to the outside. Elvis had
(14:16):
to build a special little climate controlled building where Scatter
was kept. And Elvis he loved hanging out with him.
He liked to dress Elvis. He Elvis liked to dress
the chimp in human style outfits, and then he like
he had you, would do this prank where he would
stop at traffic lights and duck and make it appear
that Scattered the monkey was driving this car by himself,
(14:37):
and he just thought it was. He was endlessly entertained
by this.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
But make me think of that that Monkey Trucker movie.
Every which way at least with that. Yeah, yeah, there's
a golden time for pet primates and weird Michael Jackson,
also primate owner.
Speaker 3 (14:57):
You're right, though, this staff really did not like Scatter,
and Scatter's life ended under mysterious circumstances. According to multiple
stories from Elvis insiders, there's a belief that the chimp
was poisoned after biting a Graceland made.
Speaker 1 (15:14):
Oh another conspiracy.
Speaker 3 (15:18):
Elvis's cousin Billy Smith, later said, we always thought she
poisoned him, and it wouldn't surprise me because not long
after that, after this attack, the monkey came up dead.
Speaker 1 (15:27):
And we've got oh man, we've got to also talk
about the high drama that Elvis, Elvis almost got involved
with the man himself is now known as being a
phenomenal pop icon. But Jordan, as you were telling us
earlier off air, Elvis Presley almost became a star of
(15:51):
musicals as well.
Speaker 2 (15:53):
Yeah, he a lot of.
Speaker 3 (15:55):
Film projects got filtered through the Colonel, and the Colonel,
as we said earlier, had questionable taste. And they initially
went to Elvis to play the role of Tony in
West Side Story, and they ended up turning it down.
And then years later Barbara streisand really really wanted him
(16:16):
to be the lead in her version of A Star.
Speaker 1 (16:18):
Is Born Barbara streisand yeah, of Yentl.
Speaker 3 (16:23):
The one and only, And yeah, once again, I think
he was just sort of talked out of doing it.
Speaker 1 (16:30):
By the Colonel, who was a baby Wow. Okay, so
we know that he could have been in more better movies.
Speaker 3 (16:39):
He was in thirty one movies. And they're all bad.
Speaker 1 (16:41):
Okay, wait, wait, wait, what's the worst one in your opinion?
In your opinion and we will quote this later.
Speaker 3 (16:48):
I mean I haven't seen them all because I'm not
that much of a masochist. I mean this one called
Kissing Cousins, which is pretty bad.
Speaker 1 (16:55):
Wait, thirty one and they're seriously, they're all clunkers.
Speaker 3 (16:59):
Some of the early one's like King Creole's okay, Blue
Hawaii's okay. There's one where he's a race car driver,
which like kind of sucks. Let's see one called clam Bake,
which is really I mean just the names alone. Let's
sell the one where Elvis he there's one called I
think it's called Stay Away Joe where he plays a
(17:20):
Navajo man in brown face. That's pretty bad.
Speaker 1 (17:23):
Oh dear, that's great. That's not great, Elvis. We also
we can dispel one common myth about Elvis while we're
while we're looking into this stuff.
Speaker 2 (17:35):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (17:35):
Similar to characters like Abraham Lincoln, Elvis has often been
alleged to be a malungeon. Uh. And that's just something
that's a trib racial isolate out at Tennessee, and it's
something that pops up inevitably when people talk about his genealogy.
But as we know, there's not really any proof of that, right, Jordan,
(17:58):
I'm not that I'm aware of. Oh okay, okay, just
dispelling that one while we're while we're on the way.
We've got to get talked about the cars eventually, but
before we do eddy of that, we should emphasize that
Elvis also saw himself as a fan of law and order.
Despite his chaotic shenanigans, he really wanted to work for
(18:21):
the feds, right, Yeah.
Speaker 3 (18:22):
He he had like an almost childlike interest in like
law enforcement, and because he liked the badges. Like like
when I was a kid, I wanted to join boy Scouts,
not because I gave a shit about like camping, but
because I like the uniform. That's basically Elvis's whole take
on cops. Like he loved cops. Wherever he went. He
would like, you know, the security guards and stuff. He
(18:45):
would talk to them. He would give you know, all
the cops in Memphis, like huge bonuses every year, and
he made a habit of like collecting just badges from
different police precincts whenever he was on tour and this
this hobby eats.
Speaker 1 (19:03):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (19:04):
He was a really blue Lives Matter kind of kid.
Speaker 1 (19:06):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (19:07):
Yeah, but it came from definitely like a like, oh
they were the good guys, like kind of right, that's
what I'm melistic.
Speaker 1 (19:14):
Yeah, it was a law enforcement yea.
Speaker 2 (19:16):
Yeah, No, I'm only bringing that up as a as
a more you know, modern touch point for that kind
of thing. But he certainly wasn't about a pression or
any kind of negative aspects of law enforcement. He just
he just thought the policemen were like like eternal.
Speaker 1 (19:33):
Career day kid getting excited when the fire truck comes
to the school, yes, right, clapping his hands.
Speaker 3 (19:39):
Yeah, And so this this kind of escalated to you know,
it's a logical conclusion. By in nineteen seventy when he
met then President Richard Nixon in the Oval Office and H. L.
Nixon gave him a sort of semi fictitious narcotics badge.
Speaker 2 (20:01):
That's what I'm thinking. Yeah, I remember that that was
sort of a bit of a pr stunt.
Speaker 3 (20:06):
Oh, but it is the most requested image in the
National Archives. Did you know that of Elvis and Nixon
shaking hands. It is one of the most sere I mean,
I understandably, so it's one of the most surreal images
I've ever seen. And Elvis took the opportunity, which always
made me really sad as a Beatles fan, to he
talks to Nixon about, you know, you got to do
something about those Beatles. They're bad for the American youth.
(20:28):
They're taking drugs and which well when when those because
you know, Nixon quite famously had everything in the Oval
office taped, and when those tapes came out and the
Beatles heard it, they were really hurt because they were
huge Elvis fans. But uh, yeah, there was a movie
made a couple of years ago with Michael Shannon as
(20:48):
Elvis and I forget who played Nixon. But about this
truly bizarre meeting at the White.
Speaker 1 (20:53):
House, right, Yeah, it's like a mockumentary style. Yeah, correct, Yeah,
I think a lot of us have been fascinated by
the Elvis meets Nixon's story. Like you said, I did
not know it was the most requested image in the archives,
but it seems like it's his I Love your Boy
Scout comparison, because it seems like it's the ultimate merit
(21:15):
badge for him. He wanted to be the he wanted
to be in the Bureau of Narcotics and Dangerous Drugs,
but he didn't really seem to understand what that meant.
Speaker 3 (21:26):
Yeah or maybe yeah, maybe he just thought that he
could get free drugs from doing that.
Speaker 2 (21:30):
I don't know.
Speaker 3 (21:31):
I yeah, it was truly a.
Speaker 2 (21:33):
That is kind of funny. How hot for law enforcement.
He was considering what an illicit drug user he was.
Speaker 1 (21:41):
I'm just I'm looking at this great Smithsonian article from
a while back by the journalist Peter Carlson, who who
outlines sort of the the way the meeting came together
and the idea that Priscilla Presley in her memoir Elvis
and Me says, Elvis thought that if he got this
(22:03):
titular badge, he could legally enter any country with guns
and carrying any drugs he wished.
Speaker 2 (22:11):
I didn't realize that immunity.
Speaker 1 (22:14):
I did not know that was part of the rational
abstracted you know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (22:20):
That's hilarious. That makes a lot of sense. Honest, I
would have thought that his naivety would have stood in
the way making that kind of connection.
Speaker 1 (22:30):
So that's it's bizarre. But it is also, I think
telling that the president of the United States at that
point in history, the most dangerous guy on the planet,
was was like, oh, well, I don't work for the
good of marriage. What what do we got? What we
what do we got? And we could give this one.
(22:57):
I don't know if we still have musicians who were
at that level of impact right or of influence, but.
Speaker 2 (23:09):
Well, we certainly have heard stories of even like Snoop
Dogg getting in trouble for having weed in the netherwise,
you know, I mean, like definitely, yeah, I couldn't. I
couldn't name one. I mean, he's about as big of
a star as they come.
Speaker 1 (23:20):
Snoo I didn't have the badge.
Speaker 2 (23:22):
He didn't have the badge, that's true. I would love
to pivot really quickly to a piece of news that
came out recently that we actually talked about on our
sister show Stuff They Don't Want you to Know. Elvis
in the seventies had this dude named Jay Orberg customize
a Cadillac for him to make it look like a
(23:42):
giant rolling guitar and the most non functional, kind of
absurd sort of custom job you could imagine, and that
has recently made its way back to the States in
Desertland Park, Orlando. It's going to under that unveil the
car recently for public consumption or for public viewing before
(24:06):
undertaking a massive restoration project that guests are going to
be able to actually watch unfold inside of the Orlando
Auto Museum. Do you know about this? This bizarre vehicle
looks more like a parade float than a car you drive.
Speaker 3 (24:20):
I didn't until just this moment and I just googled
it and it's forty one feet walls its.
Speaker 1 (24:28):
World is this? This is crazy?
Speaker 3 (24:31):
I know, how how would you drive this?
Speaker 2 (24:34):
Because guess the thing? Yeah, it's it's it's literally something
I think he would drive around Graceland like as a like,
look at me kind of situation. But I don't know
that it was particularly practical to take, you know, to
take on road trips. But it is valued currently, even
in its current state, at more than two hundred million
(24:54):
dollars in this company. Yeah, this museum. I think it's
the most valuable piece in their collection that includes cars
from like James Bond films and Batman and like you
know film franchises like The Fast and the Furious.
Speaker 3 (25:09):
That's wild. I mean, if for no other reason that
I don't know it as being a particularly special part
of Elvis lore. I mean because he's you know, the
whole pink Cadillac thing is.
Speaker 1 (25:21):
A big part of his shooting cars.
Speaker 3 (25:23):
Shooting cars. Yeah, there's a story where he was having
a fight with his girlfriend at the time, Linda Thompson,
and he wanted to get in his car and dramatically
like peel out but it's stalled out in the out
of her and he was so mad that he just
shot the car.
Speaker 1 (25:39):
That reminds me of Mitch Hedberg's joke where he got
mad at his girlfriend while they were camping. He was
in a tent and he was trying to figure out
how to zip it up angrily, you know what I mean.
So eventually, Okay, So Elvis, who was always strapped apparently
like Danny DeVito and always Sonny, he made to shoot
(26:02):
his car. He never he never got arrested for any
firearm related offenses that I don't believe.
Speaker 3 (26:10):
I know Elvis in cars, he had a special relationship
with cars he bought. I believe in the Graceland records
they indicate that he purchased over two hundred of them
in his lifetime, and he gave most of them away
because I think for him it was the ultimate status symbol.
And there was a story it's really kind of sad,
(26:30):
like he was a truck driver in Tupelo, Mississippi, and
he'd pass all these shiny cars when he was driving
these big rigs, and he would, you know, dream about getting,
you know, a nice car. And when he first got
a little bit of money when he was on Sun
Records prior to going to RCA. When he was first
starting out, one of the first big purchase he made
was his car, and it was was secondhand, but he
(26:52):
really loved it, and he parked it outside of the
hotel he was in when he was on tour and
he just stared at it all night. He loved this thing.
And then the next caught fire and burned up on
the road.
Speaker 2 (27:02):
Oh that's terrible.
Speaker 3 (27:03):
And he later said, I got a lot of cars,
when none will ever take the place of that first one.
Speaker 1 (27:07):
Which of the one car you can't get despite the
amount of money you have.
Speaker 2 (27:11):
Yeah, well yeah, And as we're wrapping up, I'd love
to kind of maybe go back to his roots and
then trace back to his end, the end of his life.
You know, he he did grow up in poverty, He
did grow up around all these incredible black musicians that
he was influenced by. He got his first guitar as
a gift when he was very very young, and he
(27:37):
didn't pass away with a particularly high net worth, which
is interesting considering all of the stuff that you're talking about,
all the spending behavior, which is also very similar to
Michael Jackson's story. He was a voracious spender and he
died passed away in nineteen seventy seven with a net
worth only around five million dollars. And that was because
(27:59):
the eight was considered mega mega cash poor. It was
falling apart. He made all these really bad deals, specifically
and unfavorable fifty percent commission deal with the Colonel who
we've been talking about all this time, really really nuts normal, Yeah, yeah,
fifty percent, that's unheard of. With inflation adjustment, that would
(28:20):
put him in around twenty to twenty seven million in
today's standards. But this guy is like legendary, I mean,
probably one of the most famous musicians to ever live.
That's just seems absurd, unheard of to have to pass
away with that little And apparently a lot of it
too had to do with the fact that the estate
was crumbling physically and they were paying incredibly high taxes,
(28:43):
over seventy percent of the value going towards all these
taxes and fees. However, Priscilla did turn it around and
turn it into Graceland that we know and you know,
quite a popular attraction, and that was that a necessity.
Speaker 1 (28:58):
I mean, they were going to lose that necessity.
Speaker 3 (29:00):
It was their family home and they're still at certain
times a year, I think around Christmas, and they take
the plexiglass down, they take the vevelt ropes down, and
it becomes a family home again. And that's like and
the one spot and this has always fascinated me. The
downstairs museum, you know great tours, That was the public
part of the house where when Elvis was alive, that
(29:21):
was where people would hang out. The upstairs is.
Speaker 1 (29:24):
Like a bank vault.
Speaker 4 (29:26):
No one like.
Speaker 3 (29:27):
It's truly like a really wonka like nobody ever goes in,
nobody ever goes out. And the story that the curators
say is that it is left exactly as it was
the day Elvis died. There's a styrofoam cup on a
counter where he left it. The record on his turntable
in his bedroom is the one he was listening to
when he died.
Speaker 2 (29:45):
Is truly.
Speaker 1 (29:47):
I wonder if they left any of his guns there.
Oh I'm sure no. Really, they go clean it.
Speaker 3 (29:53):
And like the chalk in the pool table, like in
the little draw on the pool table, is the chalk
that was there when Elvis was live. They they were
cleaning some credenza or something in the jungle room. And
I want to say they found like a knife or something,
they found something strange in there, and they put it back.
Speaker 4 (30:11):
You know.
Speaker 3 (30:11):
Yeah, everything is left truly untouched. And they're like, no
one is allowed up there. They've had visiting dignitaries, they've
had presidents, they've had you know, foreign leaders, and of
course everyone wants to see, you know, Elvis's private course.
Nobody is allowed up that. The only person who was
not a member of Elvis's immediate family who did was
Nicholas Cage, who took the novel approach of marrying Lisa
(30:33):
Marie Presley few thousands and so he apparently went up
there and tried on one of Elvis's leather jackets and
sat at Elvis's bed.
Speaker 2 (30:41):
Yeah, and it served as a symbol of his individuality
and his belief in personal freedom. Danny wild at heart
fans out there, that's what's yeah, Marry Elvis Codd in
that movie clearly was a big fan of the guy.
Speaker 1 (30:52):
And this guy, Elvis Presley, lived such a life. He
did more in his forty two years than any other
people would do in one hundred or ninety one, depending
on what Elvis is up to today bringing that conspiracy back.
Speaker 3 (31:07):
Maybe that's why they don't allow anyone up there. Maybe
he's still up there watching money Python and yeah, we've
got gold loaves.
Speaker 1 (31:14):
We've got to follow the money. We've got to do
the numbers on the Colorado Mind Company and see how
their orders are spiking on Fool's Loaf.
Speaker 2 (31:22):
And I mentioned the use of Graceland as a kind
of set piece in this series Paradise. I want to
spoil anything about the show, but all of the things
that you're talking about, ben those questions that you're asking about,
were their guns still remaining in the house, that record
still on the record player, the off limits upstairs, the cars,
all of those things play into it because if you
(31:42):
think about it's kind of a genius plot device, like
think of roving marauders and all of a sudden coming
upon this house that's left in the state you know
that it was when the man died, and all this
have this absolute fleet of crazy cars that they could,
you know, hijack. It's very very cool the way it's used.
Speaker 1 (32:01):
Yeah, because now we have seen a musician rise from
humble origins in Tupelo to become a global symbol like
more than a man. This is now a stand in
or atonomy for the idea of American culture in general.
The guns play a huge part of that. Just I
think we forgot to mention he bought guns as presents
(32:25):
for people all the time. In nineteen seventy alone, he
bought more than thirty two guns just to give out,
maybe to his mafia buddies, maybe to people he saw
on the street, maybe at a show. And get this,
I we forgot to mention this. When he had his
interactions with President Richard Nixon in nineteen seventy, he gave
(32:49):
Nixon a forty five as a president, which I don't
I didn't know you could do that with presidents. That
seems like a threat.
Speaker 2 (32:57):
Wasn't this also like sort of when I was mentioning
the pr stunt of all of that in that photo op,
wasn't that Nixon kind of trying to like look cool
and like be like kind of like I'm hip, I'm
with it. I get what the youth are into. But
by that point Elvis wasn't cool with the youth. He
was such a symbol of like the old guard and
like the square set and like the kind of music
your parents would have been into.
Speaker 3 (33:17):
Yeah, Elvis definitely had his own reasons for agreeing to
all this. Yeah, No, there was something that it was
definitely because this was the era I think when he
when Nixon went out to the to the mall and
started talking to like anti war protesters at like four
in the morning, and like he was in a bad way.
Nixon was in this era trying to desperately recover the
(33:42):
cool factor that he never.
Speaker 1 (33:43):
Had, exactly, Yeah, searching for something he didn't have. What
we had here is a phenomenal time. I don't know
about everybody else, but even from being from Tennessee, I've
learned a lot of stuff about mister Presley that I
did not know. And Jordan, we cannot thank you enough
for joining us on this special two part series about
(34:05):
Elvis Presley. Dude, where can people learn more about you?
Where can they learn more about your work?
Speaker 3 (34:11):
Oh? Man, Well let's see follow me on Twitter and
uh yeah, give a listen to post most of the
shows I'm working on there, and yeah, give a listen
to too much information that's more. If you like this
kind of you know, grab bag of facts from my
hoarder's attic of a mind, of trivia facts. Go there.
Speaker 2 (34:30):
I think you'll enjoy that credible two parter, maybe even
four partner. Jordan on the type the history of the
movie Titanic.
Speaker 3 (34:37):
Oh, yes, that was It is twice as long as
the three hour movie, So strap in, folks.
Speaker 1 (34:44):
Also also another thing we forgot to bit you on here, Jordan.
One of the most fun parts about researching this, as
with so many other topics and music history, is that
I would I would run into a sort and I
would think, huh, this is pretty good, and then I
would see it said something like People magazine. I would
(35:05):
go hang on, wait a second, and you wrote it.
You wrote the stuff I was looking up thinking Jordan
might think this is interesting.
Speaker 2 (35:13):
Oh, that's so funny.
Speaker 3 (35:15):
Oh man, that's nice to hear.
Speaker 1 (35:17):
Well, Jordan, thank you so much for joining us. We
can't wait to have you on in the future for
more strange music history and perhaps a deep dive at
the Titanic. Oh. That wording was rough and accidental, but
we'll keep it. Yeah, we'll keep it. Shout out to
Cameron Big Big thanks to our super producer mister Max Williams.
Big thanks to our composer Alex Williams. Nol who else,
(35:39):
who else, who else?
Speaker 2 (35:40):
Well, of course Alex Williams, who composed of this theme,
Jonathan Strickland, the Quizzer, A J. Bahamas, Jacobs, the Puzzler,
Big Big.
Speaker 1 (35:47):
Thanks to Rachel Doctor Big Spinach Lance even Bigger, Huger
Foolslow thanks to the Room Dudes of Ridiculous Crime. If
you dig us, you will love them. That's it for today, folks.
Tune in next week. We're getting even weirder with it.
Speaker 3 (36:03):
We'll see you next time, folks.
Speaker 2 (36:11):
For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Ridiculous History News
Hosts And Creators
Ben Bowlin
Noel Brown
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