Officials gathered Friday morning to unveil a new marker on the Elvis’ Tupelo Driving Tour, which gives fans of the King of Rock and Roll a chance to explore different places that played a pivotal role in Presley’s upbringing.
The marker is located at Relics Antique Marketplace, where Presley’s mother was employed as a seamstress during the Tupelo Garment Factory’s heyday. When working there, Gladys Love Smith married Vernon Presley and became pregnant with twins. While one of the twins, Jesse Garon, was stillborn on January 8, 1935, the other, Elvis Aaron, went on to become one of the greatest entertainers to have ever lived.
Roy Turner, executive director of the Elvis Presley Museum and Birthplace in Tupelo, explained that the factory is where Gladys came into her own and eventually used qualities developed at the workplace to have a positive impact on her son’s career as a singer and actor.
“In the factory setting, it didn’t take long for Gladys to make new friends,” Turner said. “The factory girls were all about her age, and among them, there existed that atmosphere of breezy good fellowship that is always found when a number of the same kind of people are assembled in the same place to do the same thing. Gladys didn’t feel shy. With her boundless, cheerful chatter, she was soon accepted. It is in this factory setting that she came into her being.”
The addition of the marker to the Elvis’ Tupelo Driving Tour brings the number of stops to 15. Other places include the home Presley lived in until the age of 3 and the Tupelo Hardware Company, where Presley purchased his first guitar at 11 years old. There’s even a muddy swimming hole where Presley and other youngsters would sneak off to take a dip without parental supervision.
The self-guided tour, which is constructed for cars and bicycles, allows fans to get more insight into Presley’s 13 years living in Tupelo before his family relocated to Memphis, Tenn. Getting visitors from all around the globe, printed material for the tour provided by the Tupelo Visitors Center has been translated into eight languages.
“The Elvis’ Tupelo Driving Tour helps extend the visitor’s stay in our city, meaning they are more likely to enjoy our restaurants, listen to great live music at one of our numerous live music venues, and stay in our hotels,” Mayor Todd Jordan said. “The addition of the marker at Relics means that they’re going to shop, too, so this new marker gives visitors one more reason to spend even more time in Tupelo.”
Tupelo also hosts an annual festival honoring Presley, which usually takes place in June and attracts thousands of fans.
