True Disbelievers

Elvis Contagion

George Plasketes, George Plasketes

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2018
• ISBN:
  9781351293662
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Medios de comunicación y artes escénicas
• Subtopic: Música pop

The legion of fans who refuse to believe that Elvis Presley died August 16, 1977 has been a major force behind the ever-expanding, elusive, and enduring Elvis myth during the past seventeen years. This network of fervent true believers engages in activities that include a melange of sightings and conspiracy theories. Mass media coverage of these phenomena has evolved from the underground grass-roots level to widespread publicity with social, religious, commercial, and ideological underpinnings. In True Disbelievers, R. Serge Denisoff and George Plasketes examine the implications of various accounts and several perspectives on Elvis Presley's death and transfiguration.

Denisoff and Plasketes also analyze the various media that those who doubt Elvis's death use to popularize their positions, including television, magazines, and books. They review the work of others who have written on the subject, such as Gail Brewer-Giorgio and Major Bill Smith, and raise provocative, yet valid questions about the phenomenon they describe. True Disbelievers takes a pointed look at the music industry as well, and how it has used and commercially benefitted by the continuing belief that Elvis lives. They examine common strands in the many reports of Elvis sightings since Presley's reported death.

Denisoff and Plasketes describe the Elvis phenomenon in serious, objective as well as empathetic terms, placing it in the context of studies of cult figures and their followers. True Disbelievers contains a great deal of fascinating information about America's popular culture and the power and influence of the media in modern society. It will be of significant interest to communication studiesscholars, sociologists, professionals in the music and media industries, and those interested in popular culture.

1

The Elvis Underground Network: True Believers or Voices in the Wilderness?

“[T]hey also made a series of desperate attempts to erase their rankling dissonance by making prediction after prediction in the hope one would come true, as they conducted a vain search for guidance from the Guardians.”

—Leon Festinger, When Prophecy Fails

“‘Things which are not’ are mightier than ‘things that are.’”

—I Corinthians 1:23

“A dead person is vulnerable in ways a living person is not.

”—Greil Marcus, Dead Elvis

“I’m just rather amused that you believe that Elvis is still alive,” said Oprah Winfrey. Gail Brewer-Giorgio politely answered she was merely a messenger exposing a musical scandal. Her communicative role had little to do with the journalistic “five Ws”—who, v/hat, where, when, and why—or the value-free posture advocated by social scientists. The intellectual guru of the Elvis Lives network and its followers, known as “Gatheringites,” put forth her case legitimately, refuting the findings of the Memphis power structure. Elvis did not die of a standard heart attack, as the medical examiner would stubbornly insist, stated Brewer-Giorgio in equally unwavering terms.

Brewer-Giorgio raised many questions left unanswered, which, if nothing else, provided digestible fast food for thought and placed an asterisk by Elvis’s death in the minds of many. Oprah, appearing puzzled and totally unprepared, made light of the assertions. The popular host was aided by a disappointed studio audience whose expectations for kinky conversation had been dashed. Instead, the 20 May 1988 broad cast of the show featured the author of The Most Incredible Elvis Presley Story Ever Told! and Is Elvis Alive? lumped together with an array of “social deviants.”

Whether viewed as socially deviant or acceptable, the legion of “the faithful” who refuse to accept or admit that Elvis Presley died 16 August 1977 have been one of the irresistible forces behind the ever-expanding, elusive, and enduring Elvis myth during the past fifteen years. An Elvis Lives network of fervent believers and activity that includes a melange of sightings, conspiracy theories, and mass media coverage has evolved from the underground grass-roots level to a widespread phenomenon with social, religious, commercial, and ideological underpinnings. “Elvis’ disappearing body is like a flashing event at the edge of the black hole that is America today,” assert the authors of Panic Encyclopedia, a postmodern inquiry into cynical commodity.

The devotion and dynamic at the core of this cultural phenomenon provide a contemporary case that embodies numerous ideas about communication and sociological models and perspectives. Among the more obvious communication concepts evident in the Elvis underground are its activities as gatekeepers and agenda setting. As one of the central “doctrines” of the network, Brewer-Giorgio’s Is Elvis Alive? offers a series of conclusions, most of which fall into what sociologist Egon Bittner calls a “utopian mentality,” or in Leon Festinger’s vocabulary, “cognitive dissonance.” The premise of each of these perspectives, in simplest terms, suggests that believers have a point of view and do not want to be confused with opposing information. Contradictory facts or evidence, according to this view, are merely obstacles in the way of their “truth.” In the process, “isolated ideology” emerges, which, in the case of the Gatheringites, includes deification of the leader and consumerism.

The zeal displayed by the followers of the Elvis Lives crusade is also consistent with Eric Hoffer’s characterization of “true believers.” The course and consequences of the group are also relevant to Festinger’s studies on “prophecy failed.”

The Messengers: Gatekeepers, Guardians, Officials

Eric Hoffer writes that “a movement is pioneered by [people] of words, materialized by fanatics, and consolidated by [people] of action.” This progression, a variation of news setting defined clearly, emerges when tracing how the rumor, “Elvis is alive,” has been cultivated from a popular folk story into the mainstream mass mediated network as a continuing cultural event.

Words are an essential instrument for preparing the ground for fanaticism and molding true believers for an active participation. Organizations and individuals such as author Gail Brewer-Giorgio, Major Bill Smith, and Steve Chanzes, among others, represent “people of words” for the Gatheringites and others. A sociologist refers to such leaders of a crusade as “officials,” while Professor Leon Festinger uses “guardians” to describe those who guide and instruct. They not only prepare Elvis Alive images and information, but control, expand, interpret, and organize various messages that flow through numerous channels to fans and others in the audience.

As media spokespersons they structure and tie together the wealth of information regarding Elvis’s life and death. In the process of selective perception, persuasion becomes a key technique. “Propaganda” penetrates only into those minds that are already open, and rather than instill opinion, it articulates and justifies opinions already present in the minds of its recipients. Gifted propagandists fashion messages that “bring to a boil ideas and passions already simmering in the minds of its hearers, and echoes their innermost feelings.”

These Elvis Lives advocates have been effective, not only as persuasive Presley propagandists whose words both converted and reaffirmed the faith of listeners, but as Elvis entrepreneurs who recognize an audience of consumers and exploit the adulation. A person’s preoccupation may become his or her occupation. What begins as an amateur interest may become a full-time job or devotion. That individual becomes a “professional discoverer,” looking to broaden or generalize that interest to new situations. When a crusade has produced a large or active organization devoted to its cause, the “officials” of the organization are even more likely than individual crusaders to look to expand the horizons.

Irving Louis Horowitz’s observations on the “entrepreneurial” and commercial nature of the gatekeeping process also prove insightful. He writes, “Access seems to boil down to proprietary considerations, strategic concerns of privacy, and a general premise that knowledge is a commodity that can be bought and sold and not just a natural resource to be captured in raw form.”

The words and subsequent actions and consolidation of the Elvis Lives network originated with wishful word-of-mouth whispers at the time of his “alleged” death in 1977. In 1979, the same year the ABC news magazine “20/20” broadcast its Geraldo Rivera investigation, “The Elvis Cover-up” (13 September), Gail Brewer-Giorgio published Orion, a novel inspired by The Passover Plot The premise asserts that a famous rock star escapes the chains of fame and fortune by faking his own death.

1988 marked the year “Elvis is alive” emerged from underground whispers to mainstream shouts. Major Bill Smith started the campaign with Memphis Mystery in 1987. The retired military man and record producer appeared on numerous talk shows and in the tabloid pages. Brewer-Giorgio was the chief catalyst for the cultural agenda triggering a chain reaction of activities and media coverage.

Brewer-Giorgio’s first national television exposure occurred 22 April 1988, on CNN’s “Larry King Live” show, where she hyped her Legend book, The Most Incredible Elvis Presley Story Ever Told! This was a week after syndicated columnist Bob Green picked up on the story after the rag mag Weekly World News coverage appeared in the supermarket checkout lanes. Brewer-Giorgio’s The Most Incredible Elvis Presley Story Ever Told!, in the hands of Tudor Publishing, was transformed into Is Elvis Alive?

Brewer-Giorgio’s book, Is Elvis Alive?, a self-described “elongated newspaper article” with documentation and a sixty-minute audio tape, does not declare that Elvis lives, but poses provocative questions surrounding the official accounts of the King’s demise. The book, which spawned a sequel, The Elvis Files (1990), tantalized suspicious and inquiring minds on its way to the number eight spot on the New York Times best-seller list.

While woman-of-words Brewer-Giorgio established herself at once as an official guardian, gatekeeper, and leader of the Elvis Lives network, Louise Welling may have been the “mother of sightings.” It was Welling’s “Elvis encounters” in the fall of 1987 that appeared to initiate the wave of UFO-like sightings that swept across the country in 1988. Welling claims she saw Elvis in Felpausch’s Grocery in Vicksburg, Michigan, and two weeks later ran into him at a Kalamazoo Burger King. When word spread about the sightings, signs proclaiming “Elvis Rents His Movies Here,” “Elvis Tans Here,” “Elvis Slept Here,” “Elvis Shops Here,” and “Elvis Worked Here” sprang up outside the city’s business establishments. This isolated incident burst into a national occurrence as countless other people from coast to coast caught glimpses of Elvis at supermarkets, laundromats, bars, hotels, secluded cabins, crowded street comers, fast food restaurants, and a carnival in Denton, Texas, where someone spotted Elvis on the parachute ride.

Interest ran rampant. On 4 August a four-person team left Concord, California to locate Elvis. According to mission member Brett Howard, the search team spoke to 100 people in seven states—California, Arizona, Hawaii, South Dakota, Michigan, Alabama, and Tennessee—“who genuinely believe they saw Elvis and didn’t know who to call.”

Many apparently contacted Brewer-Giorgio. The movement “guardian” reportedly received countless phone calls and hundreds of letters from believers who claimed to have seen or talked with Elvis. Mojo Nixon and Skid Roper, the duo whose novelty songs, “Elvis is Everywhere” (1987) and “239-KING” (1989) were underground hits, responded with a 1-900-King hot line with recorded Elvis sighting updates. With the unrestrained gimmickry engulfing the sightings, it was surprising no one marketed a “Missing Elvis” or “Have you seen this man?” image on the side of a milk carton. The extensive activity prompted Spin staffer Jim Greer to include Elvis’s omnipresence on his “Ten Best” of the decade, with the comment, “Elvis made more personal appearances than any dead person since the Virgin Mary.”

The media coverage, both print and broadcast, was as widespread as the sightings themselves. Perspectives ranged from those as mainstream as Johnny Carson’s “Tonight Show” monologues and Newsweek and New York Times columns, to the tabloid fringe of the National Enquirer, Sun, Globe, Star, and the like. When the Weekly World News asked for its readers’ “I saw Elvis” stories, more than 450 letters poured in, placing Elvis in forty states.

Radio stations offered huge monetary “rewards” for anyone who could bring Elvis into the station. In June, when WEBF in Westport, Connecticut offered $1 million, the station reportedly received 500 calls weekly for nearly a month. WKRC in Cincinnati, Ohio, KKEX in Portland, Oregon, WDAF in Kansas City, Missouri, and WTVN in Columbus, Ohio raised the offer to $2 million. Nashville’s WWHY topped out at $100 million for anyone who could deliver Elvis by midnight, 16 August, the anniversary of his death.

Authors, die-hard advocates, sighters, the Memphis mafia, and exploiters paraded through television’s talk show circuit for “wanted dead or alive” discussions centering on theories and explanations ranging from cancer, murder, suicide, and drug overdose, to hoax, cover-up, and the federal government’s witness relocation program.

The overwhelming response seemed to indicate that an audience of true believers was receiving the messages, and whether or not Elvis was alive, the Elvis underground had established itself as an active social network. Following Brewer-Giorgio’s appearance on Fox TV’s “The Late Show” on 6 August 1988, a phone poll revealed that a majority of the 30,000 callers sampled believed Elvis is alive.

Although the numbers diminished significantly by 1991, there remained evidence that the Elvis Lives minority was established and its activities were ongoing. In a random sample of 1,000 adults, a Time/CNN poll found that 16 percent believed that “it’s possible Elvis might be alive.” A CBSTV survey halved the number to 7 percent the same year.

Historical, Religious, and Mythical Intersections

There are numerous historical and contemporary parallels that connect with the Elvis underground. Gatheringites and Elfans (Elvis fans) are similar in their commitment and character to the Millerite movement of the mid-nineteenth century. The groups meet the conditions set forth in Festinger’s cognitive dissonance scheme. Just as a large number of Millerites were convinced the world would end in 1843, there has been a significant number of faithful fans who believe Elvis has been alive for the past sixteen years. In both cases, “second coming” expectations provided clear implications for action, which followers engaged in. At a minimum, it involved spreading the belief and enduring the hostilities, skepticism, and scoffing of nonbelievers. To extremists, involvement meant neglecting one’s personal and “worldly affairs” in order to devote time, energy, resources, and in many cases, wealth, to the cause.

Many Millerites deposed themselves of almost all their belongings, worldly possessions, and money, rationalizing that those material things were unimportant because the world was going to end as predicted. The Gatheringites of the Elvis Lives network are similarly committed to their cause. They have prepared themselves, and others, for the time when circumstances will allow for the King’s return. Reuniting with Elvis is both a preoccupation and occupation for those devoted to the cause.

There are other religion-oriented connections that can be made with the Elvis underground. Jim Greer’s comment about Elvis competing with the Virgin Mary for number of appearances by a dead person may not be as flippant as it appears when he wrote it in Spin. For centuries, people have flocked to the places where Mary is said to have appeared. Astonished worshipers return with miraculous accounts of weeping statues, peasant girls praying the rosary with the visiting Virgin, claims of the sun dancing and shooting out rainbows, plus instant healing of virtually every ailment, from backaches to cancer. “Even if only one in ten is authentic, the last 150 years have had the most apparitions in history,” says Mark Miravalle, a Mariologist at the Franciscan University of Steubenville, Ohio.

There are obvious Presley parallels in the Marian movement. The best-known apparition sites—Guadeloupe, Lourdes, Fatima, and Medjugorje—are to Marians what Kalamazoo, Michigan has become to Elfans. Ironically, the pace of alleged Mary sightings has increased sharply during the late 1970s and through the 1980s, a period that coincides with the wave of Elvis sightings. Advocates claim there have never been so many widespread unusual sightings and occurrences involving Mary as have been reported during the past twenty years.

The events have spawned a Virgin Mary network of true believers and worshipers. Like the Elvis underground, the Marians have established an “organization” that includes dozens of prayer groups, seminars, and offices that spread the word of Mary’s appearances and her messages. Typical is the two-year-old Marian Center in Delray Beach, Florida, where a staff of four is planning books on Mary in four different languages—English, Chinese, Russian, and Portuguese. Equally typical of the movement’s true believer is the center’s director, Don Ralph. Ralph is a car dealer who is among the 15-million plus visitors to Medjugorje, where six young people say Mary has appeared to them daily for the past eleven years. Like the Elfan who clings to one of Elvis’s sweat-stained scarves, Ralph’s Mary relic is a rosary, which he claims changed from silver to gold during one of his visits. In addition to the annual pilgrimages to sacred sites and testimonies of miracle and wonder, other dimensions of the Marian movement’s strong current of activity and worship—such as souvenir statuettes, shrines, festivals, and gatherings—also resemble prominent features of the Elvis underground.

In April in southern Florida, a particularly popular location for Marian interest, thousands travel to a parish in Palm Beach County to venerate a crowned, jeweled statue of Our Lady of Fatima, built to resemble the figure children in Portugal reportedly saw in 1917. In September there is an annual Festival of Our Lady of Charity, which Cuban Catholics celebrate with a Mary statue at a local park. In Lubbock, Texas, the annual Festival of the Assumption attracts an average of 12,000 followers. In 1988, many in the crowd said they saw the faces of Jesus and Mary in the clouds. Joseph Januszkiewicz of Marlboro Township, New Jersey began seeing the Virgin Mary in the blue spruce trees in his back yard in 1990. When the news of the “appearance” spread through the Marian network, thousands of pilgrims traveled to the sacred sighting location.

Such Virgin visitations have become as common as Elvisitations at Burger Kings. Whether Guadeloupe or Graceland, Mary in the clouds or Elvis atop a Ferris Wheel at a carnival, the experiences, blind devotion, and activities of the true disbelievers of the Elvis underground and the Marians weave similar patterns.

The enduring cultural fascination with the Kennedy assassination represents another striking parallel with the Elvis underground. Here the linkage is more on a mythical, as well as commercial level, than a purely religious one. The post-mortem obsessions with Elvis and JFK both illustrate, among other things, the American tradition of twisting profit from any historic moment, no matter how tragic or perverse. In August, 1977, someone asked Elvis’s irrepressible manager, Colonel Tom Parker, what he was going to do now that Elvis was dead. “I guess I’ll just keep right on managing him,” replied Parker, not suggesting his client was still alive. Sixteen years and millions of dollars later, the Colonel’s comment still rings true as Elvis Presley Enterprises represents a commercial kingdom rivaled by few in the corporate or entertainment industries. While Walt Disney’s magical marketing may rival, if not exceed, Elvis’s sprawl, not even the recently crowned king and queen of pop—Michael Jackson and Madonn...