Salem Press

	The Fifties in America follows the publisher’s successful The Sixties in America. The Fifties, however, has expanded coverage with 640 entries that... prove important enough to make this a priority purchase.
Booklist (starred review)

	Overall this is a terrific set.
ARBA

	Your U.S. history teachers will be happy with this purchase. Highly recommended.
Gale

Fifties in America
Elvis Presley

Identification: American rock-and-roll singer
Born: January 8, 1935; Tupelo, Mississippi
Died: August 16, 1977; Memphis, Tennessee

A clean-cut, good-looking, and charismatic white southerner who combined country, gospel, and rhythm-and-blues music, Elvis Presley blurred and challenged the social and racial barriers of the time, becoming the most celebrated popular music phenomenon of his era. During the late 1950's, he used his sexuality and distinctive vocal style to revolutionize and popularize rock-and-roll music.

The son of Gladys and Vernon Presley, Elvis Presley was raised as an only child after his twin brother, Jesse Garon, was stillborn. He remained extraordinarily close to his parents throughout his life and expressed a particular devotion to his mother, whose death in 1958 Presley called the greatest tragedy of his life. The Presleys lived slightly above the poverty line and attended the First Assembly of God Church, whose Pentecostal services first exposed Presley to music. His fundamentalist Christian background and his spirituality remained in the fabric of his music throughout his life. On his eleventh birthday, Presley received his first guitar and thereafter began private lessons with his Uncle Vester. His guitar would be a constant companion in his life.

In 1948, Vernon Presley took a job at the Precision Tool Company and moved his family to Memphis, Tennessee, where the younger Presley soaked up the rich musical tradition of the Mississippi River city. Elvis graduated from Memphis's L. C. Humes High School in 1953. That same year, he recorded two ballads as a birthday present to his mother. The songs garnered the attention of Sam Phillips, the owner of the legendary Sun Records in Memphis, who signed Presley to a recording contract. Presley's debut disc on Sun featured the single "That's All Right, Mama," which showcased his rich voice and his unique rockabilly blend of country music with the blues. It produced immediate fanfare. Word of Presley's talent and tantalizing performances spread quickly, and appearances throughout the South, including at the legendary Grand Ole Opry, fueled his instant popularity.

Early RCA Years and Films
Presley came under the management of Colonel Tom Parker, a dominant manager of several country artists, who struck a deal with Sam Phillips to release the young talent to the major label of RCA Records for $35,000 in late 1955. Presley reportedly received a $5,000 advance that he used to purchase a pink Cadillac for his mother. Similar expressions of generosity- including expensive and lavish gifts, often to total strangers, and extraordinary donations to local, national, and international causes-would soon become part of the mystique of Presley that would define him for life.

On January 10, 1956, Presley's debut session at RCA produced "Heartbreak Hotel." The record's startling originality and intensity riveted the American public, who subsequently helped push the single to number one in an astounding eight weeks. During that same month, Presley made his national television debut, displaying his sexually enticing gyrations before an audience whose alleged outrage temporarily persuaded producers to film the star exclusively from the waist up. With his exposure extending to both radio and television, Presley's fan base swelled to global proportions almost overnight, and he hit number one for a second time with the ballad "I Want You, I Need You, I Love You." A resolute perfectionist, Presley next released what was to become the most commercially successful doublesided single in pop history, "Hound Dog"/"Don't Be Cruel." Though it sounded like it was recorded in one breathless plunge, Presley demanded thirty-one takes before agreeing to the final cut. The single remained at number one in the United States for eleven weeks. In 1956 alone, Presley turned out ten singles that became certified gold. He used his profits from these releases to purchase Graceland, a former Memphis church that he lavishly converted into a twenty-three-room mansion. He would live there until his death in 1977.

As the first rock star to cross over into films with consistent commercial success, Presley appeared in the first of his thirty-three films, Love Me Tender, in 1957. Although his acting received mixed reviews, the picture was a box-office smash, recouping its $1 million filming cost in only three days. A string of record singles continued in earnest through 1957, including another big hit in "All Shook Up." Presley's film release schedule was stepped up as rumors of his U.S. Army draft loomed. RCA and Twentieth Century-Fox paired to release three major films in the next two and a half years, including Loving You (1957) and Jailhouse Rock (1957). Presley's fourth motion picture, King Creole, widely regarded as his finest film and a classic of this era, was released in 1958 after he was inducted into the U.S. Army.

After entering the Army on March 24, 1958, Presley served his country as a model soldier mainly in Germany from 1958 until 1960. He was awarded a leave a few months later to be with his sick mother, and on August 14, 1958, Gladys Presley died at age forty-six, only one day after Presley's return to Memphis. Throughout Presley's stint in the Army, his manager kept him on the airwaves with timely releases of hits such as "Wear My Ring Around Your Neck," "Hard HeadedWoman" and "A Big Hunk O' Love." In 1958 alone, Presley earned more than $2 million.

Impact
Presley had unprecedented success in the music industry, establishing benchmarks for the most charted singles (114), the most top-ten singles (38), and the most weeks in the number-one position on the record charts (80). Many of his achievements remained unparalleled in subsequent decades. The importance of Presley in popular music remains incalculable. The most celebrated phenomenon of his era, and for many, the purest embodiment of rock and roll, Presley's personal fusion of black and white musical influences in the 1950's produced some of the finest and most enduring recordings of the century. Presley ushered in a whole new era of American music and popular culture with his unique sound and showmanship, and he possessed a generous spirit and a sense of humor and humility that enhanced his natural charisma and made him a natural performer. His music and style inspired new generations of performers and thousands of imitators who continued to pay tribute to his legacy both as an innovator and as an icon in the decades following the 1950's.

The myriad awards and accolades bestowed on Presley throughout his life and posthumously included fourteen Grammy nominations (three wins) from the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences; the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award, which he received at age thirty-six; and being named one of the Ten Outstanding Men of the Nation for 1970 by the United States Jaycees organization. In 1986, nine years following his death, he was among the first group of inductees into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Subsequent Events
Upon his release from the Army in 1960, Presley resumed his place of prominence in radio, television, and music, releasing a string of five number-one hits during the early 1960's. Though overshadowed by the English invasion and the Beatles, who took hold of American pop culture during the 1960's, Presley managed to reemerge with a December, 1968, television special that has since become one of the most celebrated moments in pop music broadcasting history. Resembling the consummate pop idol of the 1950's, Elvis helped rekindle America's love affair with him by presenting his 1950's classics. He concluded with a passionate delivery of "If I Can Dream." Because of the overwhelming response to his broadcast, Presley undertook his most significant recording in years. With producer Chips Moman overseeing the sessions in January, 1969, Presley recorded in Memphis for the first time since 1955, producing enough material to fill two critically acclaimed albums that featured some of the finest music of his career, including "In the Ghetto," "Don't Cry, Daddy" and "Kentucky Rain." "Suspicious Minds" became his first number-one single since "Good Luck Charm" in 1962 and his last number-one pop hit.

During the late 1960's and through the 1970's, Presley embarked on a series of live performances, particularly in Las Vegas, where he managed to break all existing attendance records. By the mid- 1970's, Presley made appearances as an overweight and ostentatiously outfitted performer. His longterm addiction to prescription pain medication caused him to collapse several times on stage.Hesuffered a fatal heart attack in his Graceland home on August 16, 1977, an event that sparked an outpouring of love and remembrance worldwide. He was forty-two years old.

Further Reading
Flowers, Clare. The World According to Elvis. New York: Michael O'Mara Books, 2003. A standard biography of Presley.

Guralnick, Peter. Last Train to Memphis: The Rise of Elvis Presley. New York: Little, Brown, 1994. A twovolume work that focuses its attention on Presley's early years as an entertainer, ending its discussion in 1958.

Mason, Bobbie Ann. Elvis Presley. New York: Viking Adult, 2002. A personal interpretation of Presley's life by an important novelist that pays considerable attention to his early career.

Nash, Alanna. The Colonel: The Extraordinary Story of Colonel Tom Parker and Elvis Presley. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2003. Uses primary documents to uncover surprising details about Parker's life and, in the process, sheds light on Presley's career.

Jan Giel

See Also
American Bandstand; Berry, Chuck; Boone, Pat; Dance, popular; Diddley, Bo; Hairstyles; Lewis, Jerry Lee; Little Richard; Music; Rock and roll; Sullivan, Ed; Top 40 radio; Valens, Ritchie; Youth culture and the generation gap.