Elvis is dead, long live the King
Elvis is dead. That’s hardly news, yet rarely is that fact expressed directly. At least not in Memphis and especially not in August, when thousands of fans from around the world meet at Graceland during Elvis Week to testify that the King is alive in their hearts and in their record collections.
But if anybody doesn’t need to pussyfoot around the reality of mortality, it’s the folks who run a graveyard.
To that end, the managers of historic Elmwood Cemetery this week introduced a self-guided tour titled “Elvis Connections” that showcases nine gravesites dedicated to late lamented Memphians with a personal or historical relationship with the entertainment legend, who died Aug. 16, 1977.
Of course, Elvis isn’t on the tour. He’s buried at his home, Graceland. Everybody knows that, right?
Wrong. “People ask us all the time if Elvis is buried here,” said Elmwood Executive Director Kim Bearden, referring, presumably, to visitors who won’t be at this month’s candlelight vigil.
In response to such questions and to aid the more knowledgeable Elvis fans who occasionally visit, Bearden and Elmwood historian Kelly Sowell this year developed a 12-page brochure, “Elvis Connections,” which went on sale Tuesday at the Elmwood office. (It’s also available online at elmwoodcemetery.org.)
The booklet is a sequel, of sorts, to a similar specialty guide devoted to Civil War-connected graves that Elmwood produced a few years ago. The cost of the Elvis brochure is $15, with proceeds going to support the maintenance of Elmwood, which has been run as a nonprofit since shortly after its founding in 1852.
Still an active (so to speak) cemetery, with plots available, Elmwood is home to more than 75,000 “residents,” as staffers refer to the buried and interred. (”These people are very much a part of our lives here, we talk about them every day,” Bearden explained.)
The population includes celebrity politicians, anonymous slaves, Confederate generals, brothel madams, yellow fever victims and civil rights heroes, to cite only a few categories, so it’s no surprise a number of Elvis-connected individuals would lie in rest among Elmwood’s 80 acres of markers, monuments, obelisks and statues.
On the east side of the cemetery, for example, on a broad knoll of stone-dotted lawn dubbed Chapel Hill Circle, is the final resting place of Memphis Horns co-founder Wayne Jackson (19412016), who played on dozens of hit records by Otis Redding, Aretha Franklin, U2 and, of course, Elvis, including “Suspicious Minds” and “In the Ghetto.” The marker depicts Jackson in silhouette, blowing his signature trumpet.
To the southwest is Mary Jenkins Langston (1926-2000), who cooked for Elvis for 14 years at Graceland, providing the King with caramel pie, “very crisp” bacon and fried peanut butterand-banana sandwiches. (Her New York Times obituary included a recipe for “Elvis’ Favorite Cornbread.”)
And in between you’ll find Grace Toof (1860-1928), the namesake of Elvis’ Colonial Revival mansion, Graceland, built in 1939 on land named Graceland Farms by Grace’s father, a former pressman THURSDAY, AUGUST 2, 2018 with the Memphis Daily Appeal (a forerunner of The Commercial Appeal).
“Some of the Elvis connections are close,” Bearden said, “while some are more historic.”
For example, the tour — which a visitor can walk or drive — includes the Snowden family lot because that influential Memphis clan once owned The Peabody, the grand downtown hotel where Elvis attended his 1953 senior prom.
Bearden said researching Elmwood’s “residents” is always interesting. That’s why those who spend their weekdays above ground at the cemetery are as unlikely to seek a change of scenery as those resting below.
“People who go to work at cemeteries generally don’t leave them,” Bearden said. “This is the best job in the world.”
Located at 824 S. Dudley St., the grounds of Elmwood are open daily from 8 a.m. to 4:30 p.m.
The office, where the Elvis brochure and informational booklets can be found, keeps the same hours Monday through Friday but closes at noon on Saturday and is closed Sunday.