Memphis, TN - Graceland

Neither Gary nor I was a great fan of Elvis Presley, we were more fans of the Beatles. He came a bit before our time and, though we listened to his tunes, we didn’t buy any of his 45’s. Thus we were not really sure that we wanted to shell out $33 each for a visit to Graceland his home in Memphis. However, we realized that we probably should since we were here. Thus, Friday found us, tickets in hand, waiting in line for the shuttle to take us over to his home. One of my first questions is: since Elvis is a figure from an earlier age and his music is dated, certainly not what modern kids are listening to, what is going to happen to Graceland when my generation dies off? Well, we had the members from a high school history club in front of us and who better to ask? Maybe I’ll ask that young man in front of us who has just bought a life sized cardboard statue of Elvis. I guess I’ve got my answer. Yep, there are even modern kids who like Elvis.

Now, before I tell about our tour, here’s my hint: if you visited Graceland before August of 2014, you might want to come back. They have added the iPads and the Archives tour, both wonderful additions.

But, before we even get on the shuttle we had to get our iPads. I’ll have to admit, we have never gotten iPads to visit a museum or anything else and, now we see the future of touring. They have just redone the Civil Rights Museum and added headsets, movies, video, music, interactive kiosks and many other techniques to make the museum experience more personal. And, at Graceland on August 9, they introduced iPads to enhance tourists’ experience there. If you haven’t been there with an iPad, I suggest you might want to return. You’ll see and hear so much more. As we were heading over in the shuttle, I was putting on my headset, adjusting the sound and fiddling with the iPad to see what it could do. The answer is to make the tour so much more personal and informative.

Tour guides are great, they have wonderful stories and lots of information. But they are limited in scope. Self-guided tours with small plaques are also informative but they only have so much space on that tiny plaque. But this iPad had it all. We entered a room and it was pictured on the iPad but we could then get a 360 degree view by swiping our fingers across the iPad. Then there were little icons on the screen: a camera meant that there were other pictures that we could see by clicking on the camera. There were also little video camera icons and we could click on them and get some old home movies of Elvis and his family. There were music icons to get songs and we could listen to people talking about the home. What a wonderful tool for tourists. Both Gary and I were suitably impressed.

Now, I’m not going to go through each room nor am I going to say much about Elvis. That would be a waste of time since many of you have visited before we have. But here are some pictures for those who haven’t seen the home. As one of my friends said it is underwhelming. She has seen nicer homes right where she lives. And, I’ll have to admit, so have I. For all his wealth and fame, this home is really not ostentatious, it is large but not too large, it is opulent but not too opulent and I was surprised.

It was the trophy room where I first began to appreciate Elvis as more than just a cultural icon. I have never seen so many gold records - did he really have that many gold hits? I guess he did. Then there were the movies that he was in. Was he really in that many? Sure enough. And, finally they spotlighted all the charities that he supported and the donations that he made. And, both Gary and I developed a much greater appreciation for him as an artist. (Though when we visited Sun Studios we really learned what his place was in the history of Rock and Roll. But that’s another story.)

Nice home and nice tour and we enjoyed it much more than we ever thought we would. Then we boarded the shuttle for a 2 minute drive to the Archive area where we were ushered through a hallway lined with Elvis memorabilia

into an auditorium and a young woman in white gloves got out some archival material for us to look at. This is a new addition to the tour. There are thousands and thousands of artifacts in the Elvis collection: over 50,000 photographs, 3,000 textiles, thousands of documents and a large collection of furniture, musical instruments, awards, automobiles, and other artifacts associated with the personal life and career of Elvis Presley. WOW.

Gary and I were intrigued by the portable phone. Here it is - all of this is the phone the whole briefcase and the phone itself. Not a cell phone since there were no cell phone towers but he could make calls using it.

We left the Archives and were shuttled back to our starting point where there were several other Elvis displays: his jump suits from his Las Vegas concerts, his cars and other things. But what I liked the most was the Exit sign.

Now you might think that this sign means that this is the EXIT from a particular area but at ‘Elvis-land’ it means that it is an ENTRANCE to yet another gift shop. So funny. How many gift shops were there? I didn’t count. But there were a lot. Did we buy any? No, actually we did not. We might have bought an outfit for Gary but he just couldn’t make up his mind. What do you think? I kind of favor the red. But, he’s gonna have to ditch that t-shirt.

Hey, we saw this flag in a line of flags for foreign countries. Not one I’ve ever seen before. I asked one of the people who worked in the area and she said: ‘yeah, lots of people ask about that. I don’t know.’

It’s the Isle of Man.

In the parking lot next to our car was this neat little gadget with stickers from every country in South America, Europe and Australia on the back. WOW.

Next we’re heading over to Sun Studio where we’ll learn Elvis’ place in Rock and Roll history.