In March 1957, Elvis Presley was only 22 but his sudden fame had already made ordinary family life difficult. Fans constantly gathered around the Presley home on Audubon Drive in Memphis, so Elvis and his parents began looking for somewhere larger and more private. While Elvis was away working in Hollywood, Vernon and Gladys found the place that would eventually become inseparable from his name.
On March 16, Vernon and Gladys toured Graceland, a large house sitting on 13.8 acres outside central Memphis. They loved it and immediately contacted Elvis. Graceland’s official FAQ credits his parents with securing the property with a $1,000 down payment, while another Graceland history says Elvis formally put down the $1,000 after returning to Memphis. Either way, the family had found their new home.
Rare 1957 Home Movie of Vernon and Gladys at Graceland
The purchase was finalized on March 25 for $102,500. Elvis paid $10,000 in cash, received $55,000 from the sale of the family’s Audubon Drive home and financed the remaining amount with a 25-year mortgage. At only 22, the former Memphis truck driver had bought his parents a mansion.
Vernon, Gladys and Elvis’s grandmother Minnie Mae moved into Graceland on May 16 while Elvis was still in Hollywood filming Jailhouse Rock. Remarkably, Elvis himself did not spend his first night there until June 26. By then renovations were already transforming the property with the famous music-note gates, stone walls and other features that would become part of the Graceland image.
The rare home footage from 1957 makes the story especially meaningful because it shows Vernon and Gladys around Graceland before it became a museum or worldwide tourist attraction. At that moment it was simply the new family home their son’s extraordinary success had allowed them to buy.
Elvis Presley would go on to make “Jailhouse Rock,” “Suspicious Minds” and countless other records while Graceland became the center of his private life. Today millions know the mansion, but its Presley story began remarkably simply: his parents went looking for a safer home, found a house they loved and the family secured what would become rock and roll’s most famous residence with a $1,000 deposit.