Wednesday, March 10, 2021

The Elvis Collection: Army Scrapbook 1

Unlike the other two scrapbooks I've posted, this scrapbook was actually put together around the time the events happened.  It's in a large pink scrapbook with a puffy vinyl cover.  It's very cool.  And, extremely fragile.  I just about destroyed it trying to put it up on the scanner before I broke down and finally borrowed a camera to take pictures of the pages instead.  I don't know what I was thinking.  Every time I turned the old brown brittle pages, little flakes would fall off them.  I also had a terrible time trying to keep the pages in order.  I know.  I was making this much harder than I should have.  

  


With Elvis off to the Army for a couple of years, fans did what they could to keep his memory alive.  Elvis was offered an enlistment as an entertainer, but instead chose armor.  He also had a lot of offers to perform for the officers, but Colonel Parker said they'd have to pay his professional performance fee for it.  




"Just a routine induction."  It was a media circus.  Still, this was the best publicity Elvis had gotten to win over the people who didn't like his music or performing style.




These splash pages are really great.


In the lower right, there's a truncated article where Elvis threatened to enlist.  At the time, basically every guy got drafted.  Doing that for 30 years with mixed results in war is probably the reason America hasn't done it since.  

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