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Elvis Giveaway Concert Tickets

Elvis always had tickets to his concerts, wherever we went, there were a block of tickets, usually on the second or third row, that were Elvis’s. Sometimes it would be a whole row, but they were his to give to whomever he chose. Many times there were numerous tickets left, and Joe Esposito would let me have the tickets. I would go out in front of the coliseum, after the show started, when Jackie Cahane was doing the comedy warm up part before Elvis came on.

When I was out front everybody knew I was with Elvis, I had my badge on and I would talk to people.  Then I would decide who wanted to get in the most, and would give them those tickets. It was unbelievable to give tickets to a small group of people or a family who were there just hoping to get a glimpse of him. Not only did they get to see Elvis, but they had the best seats in the house.

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Lisa Marie’s Plane

Elvis's Plane - The Lisa Marie

Elvis’s wildest year was 1975. I spent most of spring and summer with Elvis. Between flying back and forth from Memphis and tour, I also had to run my business.  But I had a chance to spend some personal time with Elvis attending football games and we made half a dozen trips to Dallas to check on the remodeling of the Lisa Marie.

Another one of my favorite things to do was ride in the jump seat of the Lisa Marie. We had a pilot, co-pilot and a stewardess, who were regulars on board. It was really neat to ride up front in a big airplane, especially when it was landing and coming into a city. One of the interesting things was air traffic controllers would track us all the way across the country if we were going from California to Memphis. Every time we would enter another air traffic control area, the air traffic controllers of course knew the Lisa Marie, and they would ask the pilot, “Do you have Elvis on board?” And of course we’d say we did and then we would get all kinds of messages for him from the air traffic controllers- “Tell Elvis this . . . Tell Elvis that . . . Tell Elvis we love him.”

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Elvis’s Special Jewelry

Elvis had me make a waist chain for Linda Thompson with sawed out letters that said, “My love, my life” and then a chain that went around her waist. We brought her to the store and put a piece of asbestos between her body and the chain and welded it on her where she couldn’t take it off.

Elvis liked colored stones. Sapphires were his favorite, and he liked rubies and emeralds. So I sold a lot of rings that had colored stones in them, a lot of different shapes and styles. He would always buy sapphire rings. Elvis bought a big garnet cross from me. He had it with him when we were in Jackson, Mississippi, and someone told him about a little boy who was dying. It was a Make-A-Wish thing, and he wanted to see Elvis. So, Elvis said, “Great” and they loaded the limo and went to the hospital where the little boy was staying. Elvis visited with him and gave him that cross. I heard later that someone auctioned that cross or sold it for a lot of money.

I delivered the big cross necklace, which is on display at Graceland, to Linda Thompson on December the 20th, 1973. Linda had drawn a sketch of the pendant the way she wanted it made, set with diamonds in the arms of the Cross, and then it was to have two hearts which were touching at the points with a circle around them like an eternity band. The hearts were set with Elvis’s birthstone and Linda’s birthstone. Again, this piece was totally hand-made and hand-set. The base of the pendant was white gold, the border of the cross was trimmed in yellow gold, and the wedding band that circles the two hearts is yellow. It was a very beautiful showpiece, and Elvis wore it proudly on all tours and all performances that he did.

Another piece of jewelry that I made for Elvis was the tube bracelet. It was a rope chain with a piece of tubing in the center and a box catch in the back. We would usually engrave the person’s name on the front, like Lowell or Dr. Nick or Joe, but on the back we would always put their nickname or some little saying or something that Elvis called them. Those were very personal bracelets and usually only members of the entourage got those bracelets.

There are many of other pieces of jewelry I made for Elvis. Now that I have closed my retail location, I am going to have time to reproduce many of the pieces. Watch for new pieces!