Years before Graceland, private planes and rows of Cadillacs, Elvis Presley sometimes did not have enough money to buy his own burger and milkshake.
The story comes from guitarist Scotty Moore, one of the men who was there before Elvis became the biggest star in America.
Scotty first met Elvis in July 1954, after Sun Records producer Sam Phillips asked him to audition a young singer named Elvis Presley. Scotty, bassist Bill Black and Elvis soon created the sound heard on “That’s All Right,” beginning a partnership that changed popular music.
But success did not immediately mean money.
During those early months, Elvis was still dating Dixie Locke, while Scotty and his wife Bobbie often went out with them.
Scotty later remembered simple evenings at a drive-in on Park Avenue, where the couples would sit outside eating watermelon. Elvis and Scotty regularly turned the meal into a watermelon-seed-spitting contest.
There was nothing glamorous about it.
After performances, the group would sometimes go out for burgers and milkshakes. According to Scotty’s account, Bobbie was often the only person carrying dependable money because she had a regular job at Sears.
Elvis and the musicians did not always receive their performance money immediately.
That meant Bobbie sometimes ended up paying.
Scotty remembered Elvis having so little cash that when they went out to eat, “we had to buy his burger and milkshake.”
One night, Elvis finished his drink and wanted another.
He asked Scotty.
Scotty reportedly told him he would have to ask Bobbie because she was the one with the money.
It is an almost unbelievable image when you know what came next.
Scotty Moore Remembers Elvis Presley’s Earliest Days
Scotty’s memories capture the period before the entourage, bodyguards and screaming stadium crowds, when the three musicians were still trying to work out whether this strange new sound could become a career.
Dixie Locke remembered the same reality.
She dated Elvis through much of his early rise and later said there was not much money involved during those first weeks and months. At the beginning, it felt less like worldwide fame and more like a local Memphis boy suddenly getting noticed.
That changed incredibly fast.
Within two years, Elvis had “Heartbreak Hotel” at No. 1, national television appearances and crowds screaming everywhere he went.
The young man who once needed someone else to pay for another milkshake was becoming one of the most commercially successful entertainers in history.
Before Elvis Presley could buy Cadillacs for strangers, there was a time when his own friends had to buy him a burger.