Veterans Day is next Wednesday, and every family with someone who served knows how hard those first weeks away from home can be.
In 1958, Elvis Presley found that out for himself.
He was 23 years old and already a famous singer. But when he reported to Fort Hood, Texas, for training, he had never lived away from home before.
His Army days started back in Memphis. This newsreel film shows Elvis reporting for duty there on March 24, 1958, just days before he headed to Fort Hood.
Elvis reports for duty in Memphis in 1958
Fort Hood was a long way from Graceland. And Private Presley was homesick, especially for his mother, Gladys. He tried to carry on like any other soldier, but it showed.
One man saw it.
Master Sergeant William “Bill” Norwood supervised Elvis during his training, and he looked out for him. When soldiers from other companies teased Elvis on marches, Norwood stopped the march and set the offender straight.
But Sergeant Norwood could also tell when a young man was hurting.
So he did something simple. He took Elvis home to his own house so he could call his mother on the phone.
It didn’t stop at one call. Norwood let Private Presley use his phone to call home many times. He later remembered Elvis breaking down in tears during many of those calls.
Norwood gave him some fatherly advice, too. As Texas Monthly reported it, he told Elvis that inside the house he could let it all out, but outside he needed to carry himself like a soldier.
The Norwood home became Elvis’s home away from home. He spent much of his free time there, often with his girlfriend, Anita Wood. Anita became friends with Norwood’s wife, Olly, and she kept writing to Mrs. Norwood for two years.
Elvis and the sergeant even went to a local store together to buy a television set. Elvis ended up buying a TV for the soldiers in his unit.
Elvis also spent time off base in Killeen, the town next to Fort Hood. This video visits a house there that Elvis rented in 1958 while he was stationed at the base.
The Killeen house from Elvis’s Fort Hood days
That August, Gladys passed away. Norwood helped the young private through his grief.
Soon after, Elvis shipped out to Germany. But he didn’t forget the family in Texas.
During field training at Grafenwohr, he sat down and wrote to Norwood. The letter was postmarked Nov. 11, 1958, which means it turns 68 years old next Wednesday, on Veterans Day.
“Well I am writing a letter for the first time in years,” Elvis wrote.
He mentioned his scout platoon and Anita, who he said “writes me all time.” And then he let his feelings show. “I am with a good bunch of boys and (sergeants) although I would have given anything to stay at Ft. Hood with you guys,” he wrote.
And he made a promise. “Well when it’s over we will get together again and it’ll be like old times.”
Anita was worried about him too. In a letter to Olly Norwood that November, she wrote, “He is so homesick and I know his X-mas will be blue this year.”
Sergeant Norwood gave a homesick young soldier a phone and a place where he could be himself. That letter from Germany shows how much it meant to him.