Remembering Pearl Harbor and ‘the King’

Remembering Pearl Harbor and ‘the King’

How Elvis show helped raise funds to build USS Arizona Memorial

news@theeveningtimes.com

You wouldn’t think that the bombing of Pearl Harbor and Elvis Presley would have anything in common. But you would be wrong.

The memorial, which straddles the sunken remains of the battleship Arizona and is visited by more than one million people a year, actually owes a great debt to the hip-swivelin’ houndog from Memphis.

On March 25, 1961, the world’s greatest singing sensation played a sold out benefit show in Honolulu which raised over $50,000 toward construction of the memorial.

Presley’s manager, Colonel Tom Parker, read an editorial in the Los Angeles Examiner on December 4, 1960 about the stalled efforts to raise money for a memorial to the USS Arizona in Pearl Harbor and announced that Elvis would perform a special benefit concert in Hawaii for the USS Arizona Memorial Fund.

More than 2,400 people were killed in the early morning sneak attack by Japanese forces against Pearl Harbor on Dec. 7, 1941 which drew the United States into World War II. The battleship Arizona was sunk with 1,177 crewmembers still aboard.

“Elvis is 26 and that’s about the age of those boys entombed in the Arizona,” Parker said. “I think it’s appropriate that he should be doing this.”

Parker insisted that “every penny of that taken in must go to the fund. Otherwise, we are not interested in the show.” Even Elvis himself would have to buy a ticket.

Memorial boosters couldn’t believe their luck.

At a press conference in January at the Hawaiian Village Hotel, H. Tucker Gatz, chairman of the memorial fund, thanked Parker and Elvis for their generosity. “This is a little bit like a kid who has heard of Santa Clause and can’t believe it,” Gatz said. “Our sincere thanks to Colonel Parker. It’s hard to believe this is real.”

Parker set a $50,000 fundraising goal for the show.

Elvis took off from Los Angeles on March 25, 1961 where ironically he had just begun filming on his next movie, “Blue Hawaii,” for the long flight.

An enthusiastic crowd of over 3,000 people was there to greet him when he touched down at Honolulu International Airport at 12:15 p.m.

Tickets for the show ranged from $3 to $100 for special ringside seating.

More than 4,000 fans showed up. Lines began to form at Bloch Arena two hours before the start of the show.

Opening acts for the show included pianist Floyd Cramer, The Jordanaires, jazz saxophonist Boots Randolph, and comedienne Minnie Pearl.

Elvis took the stage after intermission wearing his famous gold lamé coat and sang 15 songs that night: Heartbreak Hotel, All Shook Up, A Fool Such as I, I Got a Woman, Love Me, Such a Night, Reconsider Baby, I Need Your Love Tonight, That’s All Right, Don’t Be Cruel, One Night, Are You Lonesome Tonight, It’s Now or Never, Swing Down Sweet Chariot, and Hound Dog.

According to news accounts, screaming fans continued to applaud after Elvis had left the stage saluting “more than a performance. The applause was also for a man helping build a monument the best way he knows.”

It was Elvis’s last public performance until his famous 1968 TV “Comeback Special.”

A plaque commemorating Elvis’s contribution can be seen at the memorial.

By Mark Randall