“I wanted to say to Elvis Presley and the country that this is a real decent, fine boy.”
— Ed Sullivan, during Elvis’ third appearance on his show, January 6, 1957
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I saw Elvis Saturday of last week. In Center.
Saw him again Sunday at church. Sort of, but that’s another story.
Saturday’s sighting was Elvis tribute performer Kraig Parker who delivered an incredible show for the Shelby County Outreach Ministry fundraiser event. It was only fitting that Parker’s appearance was for an organization whose mission is to help the hungry and those in need. Elvis’s generosity toward those in need was almost as legendary as his singing.
Although a lifelong fan of the King of Rock and Roll, I never saw him in person during his Las Vegas years. But I think I might have seen him early in his career. When he was performing in small towns across the South, between appearances at the Louisiana Hayride in Shreveport.
My assumed sighting was in Seymour, some 54 miles west of Wichita Falls. That was home for about four years when I was in grade school. One of those small towns where everything was a couple of blocks from downtown. Our house. The schools. The doctor’s office. The movie theater. Everything, including the high school gym where it was documented that Elvis performed in the mid 50s, was not far away.
About the time of that early Elvis performance, the teenage daughter of a family friend wanted to attend a country music show at the gym with one of her girl friends. Permission was granted on the condition they take a couple of “the younger kids” who wanted to go. Most likely a parental ploy to hinder any plot of meeting boys at the show.
I was one of those younger kids.
My childhood memories for years included a very late night, loud music, some guy dressed in a brightly colored outfit singing and dancing all over the stage, and girls screaming. Little of which made sense to my young mind.
Until years later when I got a phone call.
Fast forward to 2003. A call from Ernst Jorgensen. I recognized his name as the record executive who re-mastered Elvis’s songs into box sets and published books about his career. Said he was working on a book about early Elvis appearances and needed confirmation of an appearance in Mount Pleasant, and that Jordanaires singer Gordon Stoker suggested he call me. “Gordon says you’re from Mount Pleasant.”
“But, we didn’t move there until 1959,” I told him. “We were living in Seymour during the time you’re talking about.”
Jorgensen responded, “Well, Elvis was in Seymour, too. But I’ve documented that one. I’ll email you a copy of a newspaper clipping.” The writeup related a story about a ” Volunteer Fire Department sponsored country music show at the Seymour High School with special guest star, Elvis Presley.” Writer Doug Dixon, who attended the show, wrote, “… the crowd was impatient to see Elvis who was late. Every singer sang twice. Even the man who had taken our money at the door got up and sang.”
His account of the event said the emcee finally admitted that Elvis wasn’t there, but that he would be soon. “Eventually, most of the audience left, grumbling about being ‘took.’ Only the hard-core Elvis fans remained,” Dixon documented.
“Suddenly a girl screamed, ‘He’s here!'” The newspaper reporter described Elvis as “… wearing a fire engine red sport coat, bow tie, white shirt and blue trousers. Both coat and trousers were two sizes too large, so he could make his moves without ripping something. Elvis suddenly grabbed his guitar and broke into ‘That’s All Right Mama’… and the show was on.
“Elvis shook, danced and twisted,” Dixon wrote, “as he sang one song after another. Bill Black rode his bass like it was a horse as he slapped out a rockabilly beat. Scotty Moore’s guitar lashed out adding to the frenzy of the crowd. Girls screamed, cried and several appeared to faint. The girl standing next to me moaned and slid to the floor and lay there jerking, as if she was having some kind of a seizure.”
According to the story, after the fourth or fifth song Elvis paused to explain, “We were booked into Miller Brothers over at Wichita Falls for a dance. We didn’t know about this booking until we got a phone call earlier in the evening. … some kind of mix up.” He reportedly said he asked for a long intermission for a quick appearance in Seymour when they learned that fans were staying late. The problem was compounded, according to Elvis, when they ran out of gas just outside Seymour and had to hitchhike into town.
“Hectic, man,” Dixon quoted Elvis as saying. “Real hectic.” Elvis also reportedly said they would appreciate someone taking them back to their car with some gas after the show, and that “… almost every girl in the house volunteered.”
Later accounts in the book released related that Elvis did not get paid for either event. The Seymour Fire Department reportedly didn’t pay him because he was late, and by the time they got back to Wichita Falls, the show there was over.
Reading the newspaper article was an, “Oh wow,” moment. Was my childhood memory from the long ago night in West Texas; the night Elvis rocked Seymour? I’ll never know for sure, but I like to think it was.
Oh yeah, about last Sunday’s Elvis appearance in Center? Just sayin’ for a friend, if you attempt to silently text someone an inspirational thought from Sunday’s church bulletin, make sure your phone is silenced. And, make sure the last thing opened on your phone is not videos of the previous night’s Elvis tribute concert.
It was good, I guess, that the unexpected song was “How Great Thou Art.”
—Leon Aldridge
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Aldridge columns are featured in these publications: The Center Light and Champion, the Mount Pleasant Tribune, the Rosenberg Fort Bend Herald, the Taylor Press, the Alpine Avalanche, the Fort Stockton Pioneer, the Elgin Courier, The Monitor in Naples, and Motor Sports Magazine.
© Leon Aldridge and A Story Worth Telling 2024. Excerpts and links may be used, provided full and clear credit is given to Leon Aldridge and ‘A Story Worth Telling’ with appropriate and specific directions to the original content.
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