Dan Snow's History Hit - Elvis Presley: A Turbulent Life

Episode Date: June 2, 2022

A hotly anticipated biopic about the king of Rock'n'Roll will be released in June directed by Baz Luhmann. We've delved back into our archives to bring you this episode with author Sally Hoedel who interviewed people who personally knew Elvis—to support her claim that Elvis Presley was never going to live a long life. She tells Dan that prescription medication was only one aspect of his compromised health, not the ultimate cause of his death. She examines Elvis Presley—a son, husband, father, and devoted friend—while ploughing through the negative hype and legendary myths surrounding the man.Sally's book is called 'Elvis: Destined to Die Young.'This episode was first released on 21st January 2021.If you'd like to learn more, we have hundreds of history documentaries, ad-free podcasts and audiobooks at History Hit - subscribe today! To download the History Hit app please go to the Android or Apple store.

Hi everybody, welcome to Dan Snow's History Hit. Here's a favourite from our archive. Hi everybody, welcome to Dan Snow's History Hit. We've had a lot of heavy subjects this week, but now we've got, I don't know, is this a lighter subject? I'm not sure. It's Elvis's health. We're talking about Elvis Presley. We're talking about the king of rock and roll. Was he destined to die young? I've got Sally Hurdle on the podcast. She has spent years researching Elvis's health struggles. And it turns out he had a whole bunch of issues that he inherited from his parents. She's revealed compelling evidence of a genetic legacy of chronic medical conditions

that not even Elvis, not even the king could overcome. This was such a fascinating podcast to record. I've obviously, like everybody else in the world, long been a fan of Elvis, long found him a kind of fascinating character, but the knowledge of what was going on behind the scenes, the stress that he put himself under, and the battle that he had with his weakening body is absolutely astonishing. Elvis Presley's first hit song, Heartbreak Hotel, was released on the 27th of January, 1956. It topped the charts in the US in April and became his first hit in the UK in May. Just over 20 years later, he died at age 42, which when I was young, seemed to me a reasonable age to die. I mean, I thought 42 was impossibly ancient. Now, 42 everybody, prime of life, early peak. He was on the upward slope, in my honest opinion.

He's the same age as me. Elvis died when he was my age. There we go. Anyway, I'm just going to go and pour myself a few fingers of scotch and re-listen to this podcast. Enjoy this extremely knowledgeable history and Elvis fan, Sally Hodel, as she takes us on a journey through Elvis's health. Sally, thanks so much for coming on this podcast. Thanks for having me, Dan. Now that we can make a judgment looking back, how big a figure do you think is Elvis in popular culture history, music history, just the

history of the US? Pop culture wise, you know, I don't think he gets much bigger. And around the world as well. I always say that Elvis is as recognizable around the world as Mickey Mouse and Coca-Cola, you know, as kind of Americana, right? The difference is Elvis was a real person. So some of that gets lost now that he's such a big image. And I do think, you know, who else is recognizable, especially 44 years after his death, still by his first name and by his picture alone. I mean, I think anybody who sees Elvis knows who he is. So I would say his impact was huge. I think it's still going. It's ongoing today. Yeah, I agree. Even his silhouette, you just show someone his silhouette, you're like, oh my God, you know, what made Elvis Elvis? Like when did it become apparent that,

you know, like Beyonce more recently that he'd like pulled ahead of the pack and just became his own whole thing? You know, it becomes, it's almost irrelevant comparing to other singers within the genre. Yeah. Yeah. Who knows how that happens? I think there's a little bit of magic involved when it does happen, but I think Elvis deserves the credit for creating Elvis. He really knew he was different. He was comfortable with being different. And he created that image. He created his sound.

A lot of it was by accident. And he would have said that himself. You know, the big bang of rock and roll in July of 54 at Sun Studios with That's Alright Mama. Even he said it kind of happened by accident. They were just practicing and he was messing around with that blues song. And Sam Phillips said, that's it. That's the sound we're looking for. So a bit of it was by accident and a lot of it was by hard work. And if you read the early stuff, you know, it's obvious that Elvis worked really hard in those early fifties when he was touring across the South nonstop to create his sound, to create his look. And of course, the biggest thing that helped Elvis was the television because he not only sounded different and looked different, he moved different. It was really

shocking to 1956 America and the world. And because of the television, you could see that for the first time. People talk a lot about the African American influence in Elvis in terms of his moves and his music. And is that something he acknowledged? Oh, absolutely. And the best thing you can do is, you know, look back at YouTube videos of Chuck Berry and B.B. King and James Brown and Sammy Davis Jr. And Elvis had a great relationship with the Black entertainers at the time. And they all tell stories about that. And Elvis talked about that. I think the influence went both ways. But Elvis was absolutely, you know, without question influenced by by black music, by gospel, by southern music, you know, the music of the South country. Elvis really brought all those sounds together in a unique way. his gigantic fame, the pressure, something to kind of impact on the man himself?

Like you mentioned all that touring across the South. At what stage did you just start to change? Right. Well, my book points out that the Elvis of 1957 is just as sick as the Elvis of 1977. He has many of the same ailments already. They just haven't manifested themselves. You can't see them. They're easier to live with in 57.

But there are small pieces of evidence that if you look at his touring in the 50s, when he's going across the South, and he's 2021 years old, he does still end up in the hospital for exhaustion. There are people quoted around him like his girlfriend, June Waniko saying he was so exhausted, he couldn't have possibly done one more show yet he did one more show so there was talk of that exhaustion from the touring even in the 50s and of course in the 60s he's busy just making a lot of movies when he tours again in the 70s all that exhaustion and all that the the physical drain of touring on anybody but someone with complicated health you know history it's just more obvious when he's touring but but it's always there. And we really see his health problems, what my book points out, long before the fame, which is really important because so much of Elvis's health issues have been dismissed because of the prescription medication use. But my book points out that many of them were present before fame. And we have evidence of that now. So yeah, talk me through some of them.

Well, when Elvis passes in 1977, he has a disease or disorder in nine of the 11 systems of the body. And what my book shows is that at least five of them were present prior to fame. So they could not have been caused by the prescription medication, which is always linked to that type of thing. So his colon problem, which is kind of famous, unfortunately, for Elvis, has always been attributed to taking the prescription medication and how that would have slowed down your digestive system. But we have a relative on record now saying that as a toddler, it was a huge problem that Gladys would do. His mother would do everything she could to try to help him properly move waste to his body and whatnot, because he couldn't. He had serious constipation problems, even as a child. So that was, you know, that's a big piece of information.

He suffered from an immune system disorder. And of course, in 1935, when he's born in 1977, when he passes, there's still very little known and understood about the immune system. It was very much in its infancy, even in the 70s. So he had something called hypogammaglobulinemia, which means his body wouldn't have been able to properly fight infection. And we see that time and again throughout his life. We see it with severe cases of tonsillitis that almost kill him as a child and then flu and fever and, and constant recurrent infections as an adult. And especially, you know, in the seventies when he's cheering more, the harder he works, the, the less effective his immune system is, you know, and we see that too. So there's a number of things, heart problem, obviously from his mother's side of the family, which we can go into kind of the family tree of

that a little bit more, which is what led me in this direction. But lung problem and insomnia is a nervous system disorder. And he had that prior to fame. So there was a lot going on with Elvis. Wow. How did he keep himself together for so long on the road? Like what were his coping strategies? Well, a big part of it became the prescription medication. And that started in the 1950s, around 56, 57, probably 57, with treating the insomnia. Because he was fine as an insomniac his whole life up until all of that touring. And at first, it was a real benefit because they are driving from city to city to city, hundreds and hundreds of miles between shows.

So being able to stay awake and not needing a lot of sleep was a big advantage to Elvis at first. But then when fame really hits, you know, he could only keep that up for so long and he knows it. And because he did pull his family out of dire poverty, he feels such a responsibility to work hard and to continue working hard to keep them out of poverty. And and that compromises his health, but he finds a way to keep being Elvis Presley. And it starts with dexedrine, which combats that insomnia problem. So it gives him the energy, he can get by in less sleep, and then it turns into needing something to sleep. So it grew from there. So you mentioned his family history and his poverty. I mean, talk to me a little bit more about the other family he was born into and then maybe, yeah,

the medical history of the family as well. The launching pad was knowing that Gladys died in a very similar four-year degenerative pattern of health as Elvis did, and she didn't take the same prescription medication. So there had to be some similarities there health-wise. So looking into her side of the family tree, the maternal side of the family tree in particular was really important. And what we discovered was that Elvis's maternal grandparents, so Gladys's parents were first cousins. And of course, with that comes a lot of issues oftentimes with that doubling of the gene pool, so to speak. And we see it in Gladys, we see it play out in her siblings. So with Gladys dies at age 46, Elvis dies at 42, but three of Gladys' brothers

also die. 46, 48, 58, you know, rather young and of heart related type situations similar to Elvis and Gladys. So the family tree was super important in painting this picture. So the family tree was super important in painting this picture. You listen to Dan Snow's history. More coming up. I'm Matt Lewis. And I'm Dr. Alan Orjanaga. And in Gone Medieval, we get into the greatest mysteries. The gobsmacking details and latest groundbreaking research.

From the greatest millennium in human history. We're talking Vikings, Normans, kings and popes who were rarely the best of friends, murder, rebellions and crusades. Find out who we really were by subscribing to Gone Medieval from History Hit wherever you get your podcasts. You mentioned he was keen to keep his family out of poverty. I mean, was he handing out money to relatives? Was he living a very lavish lifestyle? How did his fame and his money sort of change him? Sure. And with Elvis, there's usually more than one aspect to everything. And oftentimes you have to hold two things in tandem that kind of are opposite. And that's part of what keeps his story so fascinating. But yeah, he came from

such dire poverty to such extreme wealth and really very quickly. You know, he did start in 54, but 1956 is just, it skyrockets him to a level of fame that no one has ever had ever experienced before at that point. And with it came the money and the money came very quickly. And money wasn't important to Elvis in the sense that he wanted to just have a lot of it. You know, money was important to Elvis so that he could provide for his family so that he could pull him out of poverty, like I said. And he does. He, you know-year-old rock star, the most famous guy in the country and in the world at that time. And he lives with his parents. He buys his parents a house and lives with them, first on Audubon Drive and then at Graceland. And then later,

his grandmother lives with him. His aunt lives with him. All through the 60s and 70s, his grandmother and his aunt are living at the house. Multiple family members work for him. He has aunts and uncles that do gate security and ground security. And, you know, he would employ them in any way that he could. And then friends as well, you know, the Memphis Mafia and all the guys around him are certainly legendary. And he, most of them came from the same background that he did. They were poor Southern guys for the most part, a couple, you know, were not that he met in the army and whatnot, but he saw himself as pulling them out of poverty as well. And that was very important

to Elvis to be a provider. And it's really interesting that that is really the factor that also compromises his health later on because he doesn't save money. He's, he's not good with money. Uh, he spends a lot, you know, he's famous for that as well. Um, so when he is sick and he needs to stop, he can't because he he still feels that obligation to keep everybody employed and everybody housed and everybody you know subconsciously probably out away as far away from poverty as possible you mentioned his physical health problems at what stage do you think they manifest themselves really as mental health problems as well that's a tricky question, you know, because

there's a lot of discussion about whether or not Elvis was really depressed or not. And I personally think that Elvis went through cycles of that, like any adult does, where life is disappointing and life is great and life is disappointing, where he was comfortable with fame and then times when he was more comfortable staying home. So I don't see him as this depressed, you know, tragic figure. His story is often one of self-destruction. And I think it's often told that way. But with the picture that my book is painted with these health problems, again, that would lead to some depression. When you don't feel good physically, it does impact you mentally mentally and I think that's also where a lot of his depression and whatnot might have come from because it was very hard for him to be Elvis it

was very hard for him to perform the way he wanted to perform and he relied on the prescription medication for a long time to make that happen and then that also became a problem so over time that didn't work either it's not a story of self-destruction. It really is a story of the struggle to survive for Elvis. And in those last few years, did he manage to keep going? Did he manage to keep working as he struggled with weight gain and all these issues that you talk about? I mean, how tough was life for Elvis towards the end? It was very difficult.

And he also felt, we talk a lot about how he wanted to provide for his family, but he also felt a huge obligation to his fans because he knew that the fans put him there. You know, the fans made him successful and and allowed and enabled him to provide. So he felt a huge obligation to the fans. And with any rock and roll star, you know, I'm sure there's a need to fill the ego. So he would want to tour and want to get out there. I'm sure there's a need to fill the ego. So he would want to tour and want to get out there. But you have to remember that when he's doing those Vegas shows and he goes to Vegas for a month, he's there for 30 days and he's doing two shows a day.

So in 30 days, he does 60 shows. You know, that would be draining on the most healthy person. And Elvis was not healthy. He had compromised systems in his body and disorder and disease. So he would leave that compromised, you know, systems in his body and disorder and disease. So he would leave that Vegas, you know, month of Vegas performing, he'd have a couple of weeks off and then he'd be touring again, you know, from city to city around the country and then back to Vegas. So I think it would have been draining on anyone, but there is a point where even Elvis knows that he can't keep being Elvis without the

prescription medication that he literally needs it to keep being Elvis Presley. And he had a lot of confidence in that because he felt, you know, he studied the physician desk reference and he felt like he knew what he was doing. And that was both a positive to be informed and a negative because he had too much confidence. So he knew he couldn't be Elvis Presley without it. And it does become a problem. My book doesn't sugarcoat that at all. But what this book does is it answers that question of why. Why does Elvis turn to prescription medication? And it's because of his health problems.

And it's to continue being Elvis Presley because it was that hard. I heard a story the other day about a famous Hollywood actor who is making movies and making huge amounts of money. But he's so traumatized by his early years of acting work and not having enough money and having to do bar work and just being living every on every month's rent check you know worrying about paying the rent every month that he's still obsessed with with needing to work and needing to provide why do you think Elvis worked that hard was he was he had he spent money had he was was he not not cutting the right deals with record labels why was he working that hard?

Yeah, it's a lot of things. Number one, he's driven to work that hard. It just happened that he ended up being a rock and roll star. But if he had been an electrician or a number of other things that he looked into, he wanted to provide for his parents and pull them out of poverty. So he would have worked hard at anything to do that. But then with, with this fame that came, he felt an obligation to a lot of people and, and that he was just a, I think he was a hyper responsible person in that sense, whether he was, you know, felt responsible to his parents or to the fans or to the Colonel, his manager, which is another big aspect, you know, he didn't have very good deals with the Colonel. So the money that did come in, you know, it wasn't

financially handled properly. And then Elvis did spend, you know, he's legendary for his generosity and he gave cars away and rings away and jewelry away. So he wasn't a good saver either. And in, like I said before, in the end, you know, towards that last year, when he says, I don't know if I can keep going. I don't know if I can keep touring. And people around him are saying, take a break, Elvis. It's okay. You can stop. And he says, no, I've got to make payroll. So he really did. He had to keep working because he had overspent his means with things like the airplane and things like that, that would require a continual income coming

in to support those lavish things. You're so close to him now. How do you think he felt in those last few years of his life? I think he felt like any human being does, you know, that accomplishes their goals. He found the stress and the pressure of it hard to live with at times. And yet on many occasions, he is recorded as saying, I love being Elvis Presley. When a reporter said, you know, is there anyone else you'd want to be? His answer was, are you kidding me? So he knew he had a good thing and he did enjoy being Elvis Presley. Doesn't mean it was easy. Doesn't mean it was always fun.

And at times I'm sure he would have liked to have just been that kid in Tupelo that nobody knew. But there's also, there's plenty of evidence that he in Tupelo that nobody knew. But there's also there's plenty of evidence that he absolutely loved being Elvis Presley, too. He died about to head off on tour again, right? He worked till his dying day. Absolutely. And he was really sick, you know, and he had had some phone conversations that week prior to leaving on tour or supposed to leave on tour, saying, I don't feel good. It's going to be, it's tough for me to go. And they'd say, cancel the tour. I'll just say, no, I want to go. Um, and then the night before he, he said to his cousin, this is going to be the best tour ever. So he was ready to go out again. He wanted to go out again. You know, unfortunately he passed away,

but, uh, he was planning to go back on tour. There was a 12 day tour ahead of him. So I think with anyone, you know, that is in that position, again, it's really hard to be Elvis Presley. And you're the one who has to go out there and travel from city to city and put on the shows. And he was doing, even when he was on tour from city to city, he'd often do two shows a day on a Saturday and a Sunday. So, you know, just an astronomical rate that you don't see today from people that are as big as Elvis was. What finished him off? Well, again, it's an accumulation of all these things. When you have disease and disorder in nine systems of the body, that's going to wear on every system of your body. He had a lot wrong

with him and a lot of it was genetic and congenital in nature, things he had no control over. The prescription medication he took, a lot of it was needed for those ailments. And then some of it, you know, obviously became a problem. And the things he, even the things he took for the ailments he had, like the insomnia, had tolerance levels. So then you would need more and they didn't have the type of prescription drugs that we have today, you know, for just for insomnia, they didn't have Lunesta and Ambien, for example. So you had to take Valium. So when you look at that, you know, that final toxicology report and there's polypharmacy going on, you have to remember he needed a lot of that prescription medication. So I think it is an accumulation of a lot of different things that were going on in his body, but ultimately the liver and heart problem that

he had, you know, the blood goes through the liver to go back to the heart. And when the liver is not functioning properly, it's going to return slower. And that's a problem. So it's kind of when it works normally, it's like water going through a straw. And when it liver is not functioning properly, it's going to return slower. And that's a problem. So it's kind of when it works normally, it's like water going through a straw. And when it's not functioning properly, it's like pudding going through a straw. So you can imagine that that blood flow problem was a real issue for him. So with his constipation, which is really one of his biggest ailments, he develops a megacolon, which is toxic in nature. And because he's going on tour, he was in the bathroom, you know, all morning

trying to clear his bowels so he wouldn't be so bloated to go on tour. And that constant straining led to something called the Vesalva maneuver, which is a change in pressure between the heart and the blood flow. And it happens, you know, during labor and things like that. But it was just enough for Elvis to create that cardiac arrhythmia, that change in heart rate. And that led to the heart, the heart attack, you know, cardiac arrhythmia issue. And ultimately what killed him. So again, it's, you can't say it's one thing. It's really, it's the liver, it's the heart, it's the colon and how they all, all worked together. And in that moment, it led to his death. I remember when I was a kid hearing that Elvis had died when he was 42, it was like, he made it, he made old bones. That's impossibly old. Now that I'm 42, I consider Elvis to be in

the prime of life, the absolute peak years. So how sad. He died so young, so young. So young, so young. And you realize that now in that when we can say he's been gone for almost 44 years and this past January 8th, he would have been 86 so you know when you think of things in those numbers it's yeah he's been gone a long time and he was very young he missed out on a lot of you know who knows i i always think of it in terms of just like gladys his mother died at 46 she never had a chance to meet her grandchild and elvis didn't have a chance to meet his grandchildren and a lot of that is because of genetic situation that they had no control over. Well, I hope his grandchildren listen to this podcast and read your book and go and get themselves regular medical checkups. That's

all I can say. Thank you very much indeed. Tell me, how can people get hold of your wonderful book? Well, there's more information on my website, which is elvisauthor.com. And you can order it there if you like. It does ship around the world. But just recently, I partnered with a group called Strictly Elvis in the UK. You can Google them online and give them a call because they are going to be the main distributor in the UK and Europe, and it'll save a lot on shipping, which was the main goal so that this book can reach fans around the world and save on that international shipping rate. Thank you so much for coming on the podcast and talking about Elvis, his life and his health. That was absolutely fascinating. I think he really could still be

alive and it wouldn't be that crazy. He's younger than the queen. The king is younger than the queen. Right. So yeah, it's totally possible. But thank you for making this episode of Dan Snow's History. I really appreciate listening to this podcast. I love doing these podcasts. It's a highlight of my career. It's the best thing I've ever done. And your support, your listening is obviously crucial for that project. If you did feel like doing me a favor,

if you go to wherever you get your podcasts and give it a review, give it a rating, obviously a good one, ideally, then that would be fantastic and feel free to share it. We obviously depend on listeners, depend on more and more people finding out about it, depend on good reviews to keep the listeners coming in. Really appreciate it. Thank you.