Rock History

1957 – Elvis Presley buys his Graceland estate in Memphis, Tenn. from Mrs. Ruth Brown-Moore.

Graceland was originally owned by S. E. Toof, publisher of the Memphis newspaper, the Memphis Daily Appeal. The grounds were named after Toof’s daughter, Grace, who would come to inherit the farm. Soon after, the portion of the land designated as Graceland today was given to a niece, Ruth Moore, who, in 1939 together with her husband Dr. Thomas Moore, had the present American “colonial” style mansion built.

Elvis purchased Graceland in early 1957 for approximately $100,000 after vacating an East Memphis house located at 1034 Audubon Drive. He moved because of privacy and security concerns, and the opposition of neighbors to the enthusiastic behavior of the many fans who slowly cruised by his home. Elvis moved into Graceland together with his father Vernon Presley and his mother Gladys. After Gladys died in 1958, and Vernon married Dee Stanley in 1960, the couple lived there for a time. Wife-to-be Priscilla Beaulieu also lived at Graceland for five years before she and Elvis married. After their marriage in Las Vegas on May 1, 1967, Priscilla lived in Graceland five more years until she separated from Elvis in late 1972.

On August 16, 1977, Elvis died in his bathroom at Graceland allegedly of a heart attack, according to one medical examiner report at the time. However, there are conflicting reports as to the cause of his death. According to Peter Guralnick, the singer “had thrown up after being stricken, apparently while seated on the toilet. It looked to the medical investigator as if he had ‘stumbled or crawled several feet before he died.’ ” The author adds that “drug use was heavily implicated in this unanticipated death of a middle-aged man with no known history of heart disease…no one ruled out the possibility of anaphylactic shock brought on by the codeine pills he had gotten from his dentist.”

After initially being buried at Forrest Hill Cemetery, and following an attempt to rob his grave, Presley’s remains were moved to Graceland. The estate has become a pilgrimage for Elvis fans across the world.