The last bit about getting away to meet the Hayride contracted obligations is not true.'Elvis Across Texas' wrote:The graduating class of Hawkins High School faced a senior moment; the Class of 1954 trip to Panama City, Florida, loomed near, and the fudge sales hadn't raised enough cash to get them even to Longview. So three enterprising young men zipped over to Shreveport on the weekend to catch the Louisiana Hayride and hopefully convince one of its singers to do a show at their alma mater.
One of the new singers of the Hayride broadcast, some guy with the unlikely name of "Elvis," seemed perfect for the job; he was hip, he was now, he was within their limited budget.
The three pounced on their victim as he exited the auditorium. Doil Stone, high school senior and future salesman-of-the-year, explained their impoverished situation. Performer and performers struck a deal and sealed it with a hand-shake. Elvis would play at the Hawkins High School gym in December.
From Shreveport back to Hawkins, Doil and company had two and a half hours to contemplate how to sell their scheme to the school superintendent, a Baptist deacon.
On this Friday afternoon, Elvis Presley and his band wheezed into town in a yellow Bellaire, borrowed from Scotty's wife, Bill Black's bass strapped to the roof. They rambled up the main drag and turned into the high school parking lot stashed behind the downtown strip.
They unloaded the Chevy in the parking lot, piece by piece, lugged the equipment to the basketball gym, where a narrow two-foot-high platform had spontaneously appeared overnight with the help of some industrious high school elves.
While they assembled and tested the mikes, amps, lights, and other band paraphernalia, the town's pride and joy, the Hawkins Hawks hooped it up fifteen feet from the stage, preparing to defeat their East Texas rivals with Jordan-esque (or in this case Cousy-esque) moves. Forty minutes into the practice, the basketball players heard a disembodied voice behind them.
Mind if I play? Asked the newcomer with sideburns.
Team captain Billy Bob Pruitt looked the skinny singer over, sizing up the competition. Sure, he said. Someone, get that kid a jersey and shorts. (Apparently Elvis didn't resemble much of a threat.)
Elvis eventually lured Scotty and Bill into the game, and in the end, the evenings' entertainment retired with a net worth of 20+ points, depending on who's telling the story. Fortunately, NBA scouts were not lurking that day, or history might have turned out very differently.
That night the inhabitants of the Humble Oil town had turned out in groves of droves, some out of curiosity, some because there wasn't much else happening on a Friday night in East Texas. Although that marvelous invention called "television" started making its debut across the country, few homefolk actually owned one. And even if your family splurged and bought a set, the TV signal in most of Texas was still too weak to receive clear images. The good news was that in most of East Texas, you had a choice of three channels, a virtual smorgasbord of selection. The bad news was that they all broadcasted snow.
So most of the population of the oil town turned out, as well as the bored and restless from neighboring villages. At a buck a pop, the closer geographically.
A deliriously happy and financially prosperous Doil Stone and his equally ecstatic co-conspirators welcomed the musicians as the entertainers rolled to a stop in front of the gymnasium. To open the show, Elvis invited petite stunner and on-again off-again girlfriend Carolyn Bradshaw of the Hayride. She was Carolyn Bradshaw, 1954 promptly whisked away to the girls' locker room to prepare, as the gentlemen retired to their respective abode to await their cue.
After a tantalizing period of time, Elvis vaulted to the stage in the memorable pink and black suit that would soon serve as his trade-enthusiastic roar from the pumped-up crowd. Like a foreshadowing of this time next year, girls screamed, cried, and did their impression of pogo sticks in saddle oxfords.
Younger girls in the audience laughed at the hysterics of the older girls, and in the back of the auditorium, student Don Dierlam frantically adjusted his new gadget, a reel-to-reel tape recorder, in an mark costume. Leg twitching, he launched into school trip to Florida suddenly seemed much "Hearts of Stone," only to be met with an early attempt to become a Napster executive.
Much to his chagrin, the tape later revealed static, a couple of F sharps, and enough screaming to rival the Roman lion dens. The jam session ended with a "Shake, Rattle, and Roll," literally. Students, reluctant to lose the concert high, bought souvenir pictures hawked by Bill Black for fifty cents and waited to get the signature of the wild man they had just heard on stage.
"How did you like the show?" Elvis asked James Dean wanna-be Lee Taliaferro. forgetting that he was supposed to act cool, Lee blankly thrust out a couple of sheets of mimeograph tests he'd bummed off a friend. Smiling crookedly, Elvis scribbled on them. Lee was elbowed to the back of the crowd before he looked down at the handwriting.
Yours truly, Lash LarueApparently, Lee wasn't the only teenager who wanted to be a movie star.
alias Elvis Presley
The lights dimmed, the teenagers migrated homeward, and the musicians packed the car for the long drive to Shreveport. The Loisiana Hayride required them to perform every Saturday, with a strict five-misses-and-you're-out-policy. So all were long gone by Sunday, when Deacon Smith rained brimstone on the impious youth of the town for listening to "devil's music." Smith vowed that sinner Presley would never again tarnish their fair high school with his "sexual-inn-u-endos." And Elvis never did. He performed at the rec center instead.
The book said the concert took place on the 17th.
The book "Boy From Tupelo" challenged that and dated it 23rd December.
Since then elvisconcerts.com has found newspaper clippings finally dating the show as taking place on the Monday of today. Not a Friday at all.
See more detail elvisconcerts.com
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