15th November 1955, Tuesday

[Graeme]

Day number 7617Site Date Map

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[Graeme]

      

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[Alan]

      On November 15, the day the option had to be picked up, the Colonel feverishly working out the deal. Bill Bullock continued to balk over the price to the very end, with Parker telegramming him one last time to remind him that time was running out and that if they didn’t pick up the option now, he believed the price would simply-go up again. Personally, said the Colonel, he believed the price was too high, and, he emphasized, he had nothing to gain from the deal, other than to protect everyone’s interests, but he believed that they should go ahead because the talent was there. He had managed to stop Sam Phillips from releasing a new Sun single, he said, but the clear implication was that he couldn't stop him for long. He reminded Bullock of the price once again and of the condition that he had inserted, no doubt as one last way of accentuating the difference between himself and Bob Neal, that there would be three national television appearances guaranteed in the contract. Then he pointed out that the banks closed in Madison at 2:00.
      Bullock was finally convinced. With his go-ahead, Parker called Phillips to ask if he wanted the money wired to conform strictly to the dead-line. No, Sam said, he could just mail it if he wanted, and sent a telegram to that effect. They would have to get together in the next week or so to finalize the deal, and that would, naturally, take place in Memphis. The Colonel went to his bank in Madison and sent the money air mail, special delivery, then wrote to H. Coleman Tily III, RCA’s legal representative, and thanked him for all the help he and Bullock had been. The Colonel hoped he had done all right on the deal; he had done the best he could in the absence of their guiding hand. He reminded Tily of the three guest appearances that had to be part of the deal, or else he would lose his credibility with the Presleys, and then he gave instructions as to how his reimbursement check should be made out, with a clear notation that it was a refund, not a commission; as an RCA shareholder he was simply proud to have advanced the money.
      In Memphis Sam Phillips felt momentarily bereft. Part of him had never fully believed that the deal would actually go through; part of him knew that it had to. But he plunged back into his recording activity, spent long hours at the new radio studio, started gearing up his new release schedule (he was determined to have “Blue Suede Shoes,” the new Carl Perkins record, out by the first of the year), and continued to pursue his claim against Duke Records, which was due for resolution by the end of the month.

[Alan]

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The RCA contract is drawn up this day and will be signed on 21st November 1955.
      

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