Page 141 - Been There… Done That!
P. 141
Been There... Done That!
drive-away tag in Elvis’ name and after some more digging, I found a letter from Foxgate Lincoln to Elvis saying that Linda Thompson would love to have that car if only it had a moonroof. They would have to send it to Atlanta to have it done. She must have gotten the car because it had a moonroof. Looking further in the trunk I found an envelope from a printer saying the enclosed is a postcard with the Mark IV parked in front of Graceland. I thought that was as good as it gets.
I took the car to my friend Larry McCown’s paint shop one block away. When I told him what I wanted he said, “Wait a minute, I have to sit down. You want what?” I wanted two ounces of gold in the paint and I wanted the grill and trim in twenty-four karat gold, along with gold wire wheels and vogue tires. Then I planned to take the seats to A & B Auto Trim and have them done in a blue velvet that’s almost like blue suede.
Larry said, “Do you know what all of that’s going to cost?” I told him, “I don’t give a damn. I want it to look like Elvis. My wife doesn’t want it back in the garage looking like this.” Larry laughed and said he guaranteed the car was going to look different. Finally, Larry called to tell me the car was ready and I went to pick it up. The $10,000 I spent on it seemed cheap considering what it looked like before. I immediately took it to the club and put it in beside Marilyn Monroe’s Lincoln. Customers absolutely went wild over those cars. But no matter what I did, my wife never liked that car. After two years of a few tours and having it in the club, we decided it was time to sell the two cars because people were just to used to seeing them.
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