24 Colonel Parker Reconsidered

The public narrative began to dramatically shift on Colonel Parker at the start of the 1980s.

What set the ball in motion was the death of Vernon Presley on June 26, 1979, at sixty-three years old from cardiac arrest. He had been ill with heart ailments for some time. When Elvis died, Vernon was named executor and trustee of the estate and received a salary of $72,500 a year for fulfilling those duties. In addition to Vernon, Elvis’s beneficiaries were his grandmother, Minnie Mae Presley, and his only child, Lisa Marie Presley.

Elvis’s will stated Vernon could, at his discretion, provide funds to other family members as needed. But after his 1979 death and Minnie Mae’s passing in 1980, that left Lisa Marie as the sole heir to his estate. However, his will stipulated that her inheritance was to be held in trust until Lisa Marie’s twenty-fifth birthday on February 1, 1993.

At the time of Vernon’s death, the estate had generated $4.9 million according to probate court documents. That was mostly the Colonel’s doing. The estate went from being in the red to going into the black in a little more than a year after Elvis’s death thanks to the 160 licensing contracts the Colonel negotiated on behalf of the estate. Shortly before his death, Vernon named Priscilla as the estate’s executor. Vernon’s death triggered a court appearance because a new executor had been named.

Priscilla showed up for the first hearing with Joe Hanks—Elvis’s former accountant—and representatives of Memphis’s National Bank of Commerce, later named “successor co-executors.” This was a more complex setup where it concerned the Colonel, who had an exclusive deal with Vernon after Elvis’s death.

The new executors weren’t looking to change things or rock the boat. In fact, they wrote the Colonel a warmhearted letter, essentially telling him it would still be business as usual. The co-executors went to Memphis probate court for approval of the compensation agreement with Colonel Parker. It was merely a formality, and the executors had planned on continuing using the Colonel’s services and guidance. However, Probate Judge Joseph Evans, for whatever reason, felt this arrangement needed a closer examination, and appointed Blanchard E. Tual, a thirty-eight-year-old Memphis attorney who was seven years out of law school, to do a deep dive into Colonel Parker’s agreements with the estate to “represent and defend the interests of Lisa Marie.” Based on Tual’s findings, Evans would render a final decision.

Tual spent several months combing through all the agreements between Colonel Parker and the Elvis Presley Estate. The Colonel complied with every request, making available all of his records to the court. Tual presented in September 1980 his research and analysis in a blistering three-hundred-page document now known as the Original Report.

Essentially, Tual charged that Colonel Parker’s salary—half of all income Elvis or his estate received—was excessive. He also claimed that the Colonel and RCA Records had conspired to steal millions from the estate, and the Colonel took a kickback from the label. Tual said the deals Parker made for Elvis, particularly those made from 1970 to 1977, cost his client millions in potential earnings and denied his estate substantial income.

The report was especially critical of the 1973 deal in which RCA Records paid $5.4 million for Elvis’s master recordings—a deal the Colonel tried to talk Elvis out of making. But Tual lay the sole blame at the Colonel’s feet, which was uninformed, unfair, and hard to take back.

The report also implied that Colonel Parker was so deep into the hole in terms of gambling debts owed to the Las Vegas Hilton that he was no longer serving Elvis at all, and in fact was working against Elvis’s best interests. But where he got this information is suspect because certainly not one of Colonel’s business associates at the Hilton would ever tell him that, which leads me to believe his sources either weren’t in the know or had an axe to grind.

Tual concluded at the time: “Elvis was shy and unassertive. Parker was aggressive, shrewd, and tough. His strong personality dominated Elvis, his father, and all others in Elvis’s entourage.”

Elvis Presley shy and unassertive? I don’t think he could ever be accused of those two personality traits.

Another Tual statement: “The Colonel was a very strong-willed, domineering person who I think had total control over Elvis. I think Elvis was … intimidated by him.”

These comments are not only laughable but demonstrate to me that all his hours of research did not give Tual the slightest understanding of their relationship. Elvis was not naïve, shy, or unassertive as Tual declared. Elvis was not intimidated by anyone and certainly not the Colonel. He was very strong-willed and set the financial tone with Colonel Parker early on, according to Joseph Hanks, who served as Elvis’s accountant from 1969–1977.

“Colonel Parker told me in the early going when they got started that he tried to advise Elvis about things like that [tax shelters and investments], and Elvis told him, ‘You take care of the money coming in, and me and my daddy will take care of it going out,’” Hanks told Stephen G. Tompkins, a reporter for the Scripps-Howard News Service. The Colonel adhered to Elvis’s wishes and followed that mandate their entire working relationship.

The Colonel brought great opportunities to Elvis and made him an estimated $100 million over their twenty-two-year relationship. But according to Tual, he cheated Elvis out of millions. That was rich, because Tual’s guardianship certainly didn’t come cheap. He presented Judge Evans, who appointed him to investigate the Presley-Parker relationship, a bill for $155,000 in October 1981.³⁶ He claimed that he worked between 1,500 and 1,600 hours on behalf of Lisa Marie Presley, getting close to $100 an hour—an amount that was top dollar for an attorney in the South. Even Judge Evans thought that amount was an overreach and decided to give him $15,000 less than he requested.

“I thought $155,000 was a little high,” Evans said in the article. “He is still serving and will be entitled to another fee later. I thought he was well compensated.” Tual remained mum on the subject when a UPI reporter asked him for comment.

Regardless, Tual’s interpretation of their business relationship tainted the public image of the Colonel—he was vilified in the media and by Elvis fans, many of whom quickly turned on him. These allegations also strained his relationship with the Presley Estate, but that was tainted by the probate court. Based on the report, Judge Evans brought down the hammer on Colonel Parker and ordered the co-executors for the Presley Estate to file suit against him and RCA Records for “fraudulent business practices.” The estate complied, but, I believe, were reluctant to sue. They knew the Colonel’s heart and how he felt about Elvis. He was family to them.

“The estate was forced by the state of Tennessee to proceed,” Loanne Miller said in 2004. “In fact, the estate refused to make charges against the Colonel, and that’s in the court record. The judge [Evans]ordered them to proceed, or they would be replaced. So, there was never the problem between the estate and the Colonel, that’s another one of those stories.”

The Presley Estate was truly between a rock and a hard place. They were forced to bring a suit that sought to sever Parker’s existing relationship with the estate. Colonel Parker replied with a countersuit in Nevada, and RCA also filed suit against the estate in federal court in Nashville. A settlement was finally reached, with the estate essentially buying the Colonel out for $2 million for his “right, title and interest in all Presley related contracts.” He received regular payments from the estate until 1987 as well as $225,000 for the Colonel’s shares in Boxcar Enterprises.

In turn, RCA agreed to pay the Presley estate $1.1 million to settle all disputes.

As they were signing the final settlement papers, Priscilla smiled at Colonel Parker and said, “I wish you were my manager.” To this very day she remains a staunch supporter of the Colonel and constantly defends him in the press. She even defended him to actor Tom Hanks, who portrayed Colonel Parker in the 2022 Baz Luhrmann film Elvis, when he and his wife, Rita Wilson, took Priscilla to dinner. Hanks already had his mind made up about Parker before he even stepped foot in front of the camera, calling him a “scoundrel.” Then he got the other side of the story from Priscilla.

“I was expecting to hear stories about the distrust she had for Colonel Tom Parker over these many years,” Hanks told a reporter for Variety. “And she said, ‘No. He was a wonderful man, and I wish he was alive today. He took really great care of us.’”

He sure did. But that’s not the narrative the public is willing to believe after all these years despite Priscilla’s protestations.

With all the legal hurdles cleared between the Presley Estate and Colonel Parker, Elvis’s life, career, and legacy could now be fully explored. That was set in motion when Priscilla Presley enlisted Jack Soden, then a thirty-five-year-old stockbroker from Kansas City, to become executive director of the Graceland division of Elvis Presley Enterprises, Inc. Together the two prepared Graceland for a public opening on June 7, 1982. Prior to Graceland’s opening, Memphis tourism was in the doldrums. Graceland quickly became the cornerstone of the tourist industry for the city and the region.

Graceland has hosted more than twenty million visitors, and is second-most-visited homes. (The others are the White House; the Biltmore Estate in Asheville, North Carolina; 1892 Bishop’s Palace in Galveston, Texas; and Hearst Castle in San Simeon, California.) In 1991, Graceland was placed on the National Register of Historic Places. In 2006, it was designated a National Historic Landmark.

Today Graceland hires up to 450 employees a year, both full- and part-time, and has an estimated $150 million economic impact on the city of Memphis. In 2019, the estate earned approximately $39 million. Some years, the estate earns even more. According to a 2020 Forbes magazine article, the estate is worth somewhere between $400 to $600 million.

Colonel Parker would be proud of how Priscilla Presley, Lisa Marie Presley, and Jack Soden have sought out an amazing team of partners in Joel Weinshanker and the Authentic Brands Group (Jamie and Corey Salter) to keep Elvis Presley not only fresh and relevant in the twenty-first century, but to retain his status as the biggest entertainer in history as well.

Even before the 1983 lawsuit with the Presley Estate was settled, Colonel Parker picked up the phone and called Jack Soden shortly after the opening of Graceland and made a peace offering. He told Soden that despite his lawsuit with the Presley Estate, he was willing to help him in any future endeavors involving Elvis and Graceland. At this point, everyone associated with the estate was a bean counter or lawyer, and they didn’t know the music business or how to run a museum attraction featuring an artist of Elvis’s stature. The Colonel didn’t want to see Elvis’s legacy disappear or Graceland to fall into someone else’s hands.

Soden took Colonel Parker at face value, and they developed a nice friendship over the years. Their relationship continued to bear fruit for Elvis Presley Enterprises, who invited Colonel Parker to work on special projects for them in the coming years. The biggest harvest came in 1990 when Colonel Parker unloaded the large collection of Elvis items he had packed away in four buildings outside of Nashville. It contained scrapbooks of news clippings, magazine articles and ads, original contracts for movies and television appearances, letters, telegrams, invoices, and even fan mail going back to 1955. The collection also included multiple samples of original souvenir and promotional memorabilia through the years, including the original pressing plates and artwork from which they were made. And he had numerous newsreels and interview audiotapes, acetate recordings, original copies of every record Elvis ever released, and thousands of original photographs and negatives spanning Elvis’s entire career.

Colonel sold the items, which filled seven semitrailer trucks and weighed an estimated thirty-five tons, for a bargain basement price of $2 million. The collection, which even included Elvis’s 1957 gold lamé suit, considered one of the most iconic rock outfits in history, was a wise investment for the estate as the collection is probably worth a hundred times the original asking price more than three decades after the sale. It’s also a safe bet the collection spawned several projects for Elvis Presley Enterprises, including new and exciting displays at Graceland to keep the faithful coming year after year.

My relationship with Colonel Parker did not end after Elvis’s death. In fact, we drew closer to each other. My family and I spent numerous weekends with the Colonel and almost every holiday with him and Marie, even though she couldn’t speak at this point. My children knew them as “Aunt Marie” and “Colonel.” He, in fact, named my twins Suzanne Marie and Thomas Andrew when he came to the hospital to visit Sherry with a roomful of Elvis Presley hound dogs and teddy bears for Sherry and the kids. While I was scurrying back from Los Angeles, he posed as her husband and filled out the birth certificate paperwork, naming the two the children after he and Marie. It was a gag, but Sherry and I decided to keep the names.

He doted on our children, played games with them, and taught them funny little songs and poems, including “The Hot Dog Vendor’s Call” from his carny days. On birthdays, he’d call them on the phone and play them “Happy Birthday” on his harmonica. He also did that for me and my wife, Sherry, and his gardener, Woody Logan. In fact, if you did not get a phone call from Colonel Parker on your birthday, it meant you were in trouble.³⁷

The Colonel loved Sunday brunch, and we usually dined at the Ingleside Inn, Lord Fletcher’s, and Howard Manor in Palm Springs, and a family restaurant called Hayden’s in nearby Desert Hot Springs. I also accompanied the Colonel on a lot of his visits to the grocery store, where he loaded up on meats and all sorts of specialties. He talked a lot about his Dutch past as we strolled down the aisles and admired the variety of goods available to shoppers.

“I would dream to have this kind of selection and bring this kind of food home to my family,” he once said. “We couldn’t have dreamed this!”

The Colonel never forgot to count his blessings, and perhaps he regarded it as one when Marie Parker finally—and mercifully—passed away on November 25, 1986, of chronic brain syndrome. She was seventy-eight. Marie’s quality of life had declined steadily over a decade, but the Colonel provided around-the-clock love, protection, and care with a staff that included wonderful caregivers. They include Teresa Davis, Mary Estler, Nina Garcia, and Polly Valdivia. Nacho Garcia took care of the grounds and watched over the ladies. Every one of them loved Marie and played board games with her for hours.

After her death, the Colonel moved to Las Vegas, where he had two things going for him: a familiar home and someone who deeply cared for him.

Barron Hilton’s friendship with Colonel Parker extended well beyond Elvis’s passing, and the two not only remained friends, but the Colonel was still on an annual retainer for entertainment advice. People might say that Hilton was being overly kind, but he probably knew what most others didn’t understand: The Colonel and Elvis were brand ambassadors for the Hilton since 1969. Not only did they bring the Hilton name great recognition during Elvis’s twice-annual residency in Sin City, but while on tour, they also made a point of staying at a Hilton Hotel whenever they could.

Loanne Miller, who had worked with Colonel Parker since 1970, married him on October 19, 1990, a few years after Marie’s passing. She was twenty-five years younger than Colonel Parker, and she not only understood him, but went to great lengths to take care of him. She kept him in good humor and health, making sure he took his medications and shuttling him to doctor’s appointments. He would not have lived as long as he did without Loanne, and for that, she earned our love and respect. Besides, she was just a great lady and a real joy to be around. She was very special.

Despite his new address, I still saw Colonel Parker about once a month. Ricky Nelson often played Las Vegas, which gave me an opportunity to visit with the Colonel and Loanne. They lived in a high-rise apartment on a golf course behind the Hilton, and later moved into a nice townhome. He liked the slot machines, roulette wheel, and craps table, jokingly saying that gambling was his form of exercise.

The Colonel loved Las Vegas and being around the action. He lived and breathed show business and, in addition to Barron Hilton and Alex Shoofey, he was very friendly with Milton Prell of the Sahara and casino mogul Steve Wynn of Wynn Resorts. Many of his friends, including Eddy Arnold, Jerry Lee Lewis, Roy Orbison, Rick Nelson, Frank Sinatra, and George Strait³⁸ performed there, and Colonel Parker and Loanne could usually be found in the audience on their opening nights. Everything was comped: from backstage passes, the ticket to the show, a nice dinner, and everything else the Colonel could extract from these artists. He was still a carny at heart.

The Colonel lent his name to charitable causes, and he not only cut these nonprofits a check but also showed up in person for fundraising activities and dinners, especially where it concerned the Las Vegas SUN Summer Camp Fund. He helped them raise thousands of dollars each year to provide less fortunate children a summer camp experience away from the stifling heat of Southern Nevada. He honestly believed that America was the greatest country in the world and was grateful that it gave him the ability to earn a nice living and enjoy a nice life.

The Colonel was also a soft touch when it came to former members of the Memphis Mafia. He might have been sentimental, though he didn’t show it. I know for a fact he lent a few of them money when they were down-and-out or going through a rough patch, and I have the canceled checks to prove it. He also wrote many letters of endorsements to prospective employers so these individuals could be hired. Even though they worked for Elvis Presley, which carried a lot of weight in those days, many of them found the transition to “civilian” life tricky and hard. A letter of commendation from Colonel Parker often meant working or collecting an unemployment check.

He also forgave some of the men. I know that Sonny West made amends with the Colonel for his participation in Elvis: What Happened? when he visited him in Las Vegas. I doubt if the book was actually brought up in conversation, but the two men had one major thing in common: they loved Elvis Presley, and that was enough. Time and wisdom seemed to heal those old wounds. Besides, these two had spent many years and experienced something very special together. They knew it was better to bury the hatchet than let any bad feelings linger. Now, I’m not saying this was the case with all the Memphis Mafia, and I doubt this bothered the Colonel in any way. However, he was more than willing to see anyone who wished to see him. Many of them did and found their visits fun and exciting.

Even though Colonel Parker was in his twilight years (he was now in his eighties), there was still no shortage of entertainers clamoring for his services. The Colonel would wish them success and offer all the free advice they’d ever need, but it was always a hard no. He didn’t need the money or the aggravation. And besides, Elvis was a hard act to follow.

“I’ve had the greatest,” he’d say. “Anything else would be a step down.”

He did make an exception of sorts by advising Ricky Nelson’s sons Matthew and Gunnar about a year after their father’s death.

Gunnar Nelson explains: “Greg McDonald brought us down to the Colonel’s house in Palm Springs. We were still nursing our wounds and hanging out aimlessly, spending money we didn’t have, impressing people that didn’t matter. Greg heard it in our voice when we called him in Palm Springs and figured we needed a father figure. He picked us up in Los Angeles and took us to the Colonel’s house. The funny thing was, everything in that house was blue—and I mean everything!

“He asked us to tell our story, and we told him that we were the only unsigned band in history to be the musical guests on Saturday Night Live, but we’d broken up immediately after the performance. I was playing the drums at the time and wanted to come up front and sing alongside my brother Matthew. We told him we were very frustrated because we couldn’t seem to get the right guys for our new band. Without missing a beat, the Colonel looked up and said, ‘You boys don’t need a band. Ever. Just you two and two acoustic guitars. That’s it.’

“I was a headstrong kid, still in my late teens, who’d always played in rock bands on the LA club circuit, looking at this old guy and thinking, Yeah, his time has passed. What the heck does he know? The irony, looking back, is that every huge break in mine and Matthew’s career—from getting signed to Geffen Records to playing in front of 66,000 people in Erie, Pennsylvania—was that our success was due to no band, two brothers with two acoustic guitars. That old man was a genius!

“As Nelson, we have sold ten million albums, scored a number one hit ‘(Can’t Live Without Your) Love and Affection,’ had a bunch of Top Ten singles, and have sustained a career for more than three decades. But if we’d only listened to his advice from the beginning, we would have ten-folded our career in a fifth of the time. What did the Colonel know? Are you kidding me?! I’m such a schmuck not listening to him from the very beginning.

“But we’re listening to his advice now … that’s for sure!”

The Colonel admitted that over the years he had an opportunity to cash in on a book he was writing with Loanne called How Much Does It Cost if It’s Free? However, he spurned numerous offers—many in the seven-figure range—because he felt publishers didn’t want to hear the truth about their relationship and only wanted the dirt on Elvis.

“I’d tell them I’m not a dirt farmer,” he quipped.

Colonel Parker made fewer and fewer public appearances as time went on. He tipped the scales at three hundred pounds, walked with a cane, and still smoked his beloved cigars. He did, however, manage to keep his mind sharp and alert. He woke most mornings around 5:00 A.M., called old friends and associates, dictated letters to Loanne, and concocted promotions that didn’t go anywhere. But he never tired of the action, and it never left his blood.

I brought Colonel Parker back to Palm Springs in 1994 so he could receive a star on the Palm Springs Walk of Stars. The Walk of Stars was established in 1992 to honor and recognize celebrities, politicians, authors, playwrights, screenwriters, and pioneers who have lived at one time or another in the desert village. It was very helpful for Palm Springs downtown redevelopment, which was just starting to pull through a long recession dating back to the late 1980s.

I bought stars for Elvis, Ricky Nelson, and Colonel Parker, all in front of the Welwood Murray Library. It was at the intersection of Tahquitz Canyon and Palm Canyon Drive smack dab in the center of Palm Springs. It’s where the heaviest pedestrian traffic flowed, and the place where I felt they would get the most eyeballs. But the library wasn’t happy with my purchase. In fact, they were furious with me because they felt their benefactor should have had his star located on the same exact spot. However, they didn’t have the foresight or the gumption to shell out the money. They sent me a nasty gram stating they were going to “turn the matter over to their attorney” and discuss this with city hall.

And they did. The city manager, Norm King, called me, and we laughed about it.

“When people come to Palm Springs, they’re going to want to have their picture taken with Elvis, Ricky, and the Colonel … and probably not Welwood Murray,” I said. He agreed and assured me the city would not pursue the matter. However, the story made the front page of the Palm Springs Desert Sun and the Riverside Press-Enterprise, which only drew more people to the event. More than a thousand people showed up for the dedication, including twenty Elvis tribute artists. Colonel Parker was ecstatic that so many people showed up to pay their respects.

Barron Hilton jetted in Colonel Parker and Loanne from Las Vegas, and Elvis Presley Enterprises sent Jerry Schilling as their representative, and I picked them all up at the airport. After a meal, we headed over to the ceremony. When the Colonel stepped out of the car, the crowd greeted him with thunderous applause and cheers. Mayor Lloyd Maryanov³⁹ officiated the event and unveiled the three stars.

I would say it was one of Colonel Parker’s happiest days in his later years. It was a big day for the Colonel and one of the happiest days I’d ever spent with him. We even shared a running joke that I paid $7,500 apiece for the stars and didn’t get a discount.

“Back in the day, I would have charged $25,000 to put Elvis’s name on the sidewalk,” he chuckled.

The Colonel rarely left his apartment in his ninth decade but mustered the strength to attend an eighty-fifth birthday bash thrown by Barron Hilton in June. Both Priscilla Presley and Jack Soden were in attendance, as were many of the Colonel’s friends and associates from the past. Barron Hilton even had classy five-and-a-half-by-nine-inch programs printed for the affair, which was held at the Hilton Center. On the cover, it featured a side profile of a smiling Colonel Parker sporting a ten-gallon cowboy hat. The masthead of the program read: “Our Colonel.”

Perhaps the best surprise of all—Governor Bob Miller declared June 25, 1994, as Colonel Tom Parker Day in Nevada. That was a day before the Colonel’s birthday … but it was the thought that counted.

The last few years of Colonel Parker’s life were not kind. Father Time was catching up to him, and he suffered from diabetes, arthritis, gout, and other health issues. He was essentially housebound near the end. That finally came on Tuesday, January 21, 1997, when he died of complications from a stroke. He was eighty-seven.

I was in the south of France on vacation with my family when I received word of Colonel Parker’s passing. Loanne called me in the middle of the night to let me know that he died quickly. She said I was the first call. The Colonel would have wanted it that way, she said.

Of course, I knew the end was near, and I shed more than a few tears that evening. He was a father figure and nothing but kind to me. I had known him since I was a kid, and he was a large part of my life. I owed my entire career to this man. He took me in because he saw a child much like the child he had been in his youth. I needed stability, an education, and a nudge or two in the right direction. I lived with him and Marie, left for school each day from their home, and came home to sit by the Colonel while he cooked on the grill, rolled a cigar in his mouth, and told me stories about his days traveling the world and living the carny life. I asked a million questions of him, and he answered each one thoughtfully and with patience. He taught me his trade and craft and introduced me to the life I live now. I would not have what I have now or be the person I am now without him. He smiled every time I walked into the room. How can you ever possibly repay someone who was everything to you?

His funeral was held at the Hilton Hotel four days after his passing. It was attended by a gathering of people from his past and present: Eddy Arnold, Sam Phillips, Jerry Weintraub, Phyllis McGuire, Steve Wynn, Jack Soden, and Priscilla Presley, who gave a touching and funny eulogy.

“Elvis and the Colonel made history together, and the world is richer, better, and far more interesting because of their collaboration,” she said. “And now I need to locate my wallet because I noticed there was no ticket booth on the way in here, but I’m sure that the Colonel must have arranged for some toll on the way out.”

Even Colonel Parker would have laughed heartily at the gentle but funny barb and tipped his hat to the beautiful lady who had a special place in his heart.

Over the years, Colonel Parker’s reputation remains tainted, especially with new offerings such as Luhrmann’s 2022 film Elvis, the musical-drama which paints Elvis as a caged bird and the Colonel as a greedy opportunist constantly lurking in the shadows. The funny thing about Colonel Parker is that he was like a human peacock. He enjoyed being recognized and commanded attention and respect. The shadows are the last place you’d find him. In this new retelling, Elvis was a “showman” and the Colonel was a “snowman” who routinely victimized and undermined his client throughout their two-decade partnership. The movie did not highlight many of the Colonel’s great accomplishments, which were innovative and now part of the fabric of the entertainment industry. I could write an entire book on all the things the movie got wrong, but I don’t want to waste that much ink on the film.

Sadly, for younger Elvis fans who have no other point of reference, this 159-minute biopic will likely be the last word for them. But those who knew and loved Colonel Parker, including Priscilla Presley,⁴⁰ will always defend him. And so will I … to my death.

Elvis Presley Enterprises forgave the Colonel for errors he might have had in judgment—few, if any—a long time ago, but most Elvis fans still haven’t been able to do the same. That’s sad. If they had been in a dressing room or backstage with the two of them during those epic years, they would know the truth in a second. The Colonel would no more have duped Elvis than he would have kicked a puppy. But every epic needs a villain as well as a hero. That person cannot be one and the same. The myth demands someone else be blamed for all of Elvis’s missteps and mistakes. The fingers pointed at the Colonel after Elvis’s death have never unflexed. It’s not fair. He loved the fans as much as they loved his boy. Perhaps future generations will read this book and have a kinder view of Colonel Tom Parker.

After all, he’s the man who brought them Elvis Presley, the greatest show on earth.

Greg, Sherry, and the Colonel. Courtesy of Greg Marshall