Published: June 7, 2023

JULIEN’S AUCTIONS

THE ICON NEWSLETTER

6.7.23

Elvis Presley was passionate about numerology – the study of numbers to reveal hidden meanings – and he is known to have performed multiple readings for friends and loved ones.

Our recent “Music Icons” auction featured notes from Presley’s reading for his wife Priscilla, which included both her and her sister’s names. In an accompanying letter, Larry Geller, Presley’s spiritual advisor and personal hair stylist, writes:

“He looked into the names and converted them into numbers so as to reveal their inner meaning…Elvis delved into the spiritual significance of their names and how it related to his life.”

In 1969, Presley met Cassandra Peterson, then a showgirl, who would become world-famous as Elvira, Mistress of the Dark. She told him how his movie Viva Las Vegas (Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, 1964) inspired her to become a Vegas performer. In Yours Cruelly, Elvira (Hachette Books, 2021), she writes:

“He explained that what had happened to me was no coincidence. For emphasis, he grabbed an envelope…and scribbled some numbers and letters on the front and back. The numbers correlated to letters that spelled out words like ‘love,’ ‘light,’ and ‘home.’”

Presley advised her to get singing lessons and leave Las Vegas, which changed the course of her life. The envelope sold for $4,480 in our 2021 sale “Property from the Collection of Elvira, Mistress of the Dark.”

On August 6, 1977, ten days prior to his death, Presley discussed numerology with his fiancé and final companion, Ginger Alden, the notes from which were sold for $5,600 in our 2017 “Icons & Idols” auction, and included the words “Heart,” “Gospel,” “Gift,” “America,” “Wo-Man,” “Man,” and “Whole.” In an accompanying letter, Alden wrote:

“Elvis Presley was on a spiritual journey before his death, and he was working through his thoughts on these two sheets of yellow stationery.”

It’s through personal items like these that we are able to learn more about the private lives of our favorite stars.

We have one special Elvis lot in our current “Sports Legends” auction taking place next week, a framed photo of the King of Rock ‘N’ Roll sparring with boxing’s all-time greatest, Muhammad Ali. The photo was signed by Ali, who inscribed “Peace + Love ‘01” in 2001.