Elvis Presley's two-room birthplace in Tupelo, built by Vernon Presley for his family, stood unchanged from the 1930's and later became the center of a preservation effort funded by proceeds from Elvis's 1957 concert at the Mississippi-Alabama Fair. As his fame grew and fans came to see the house, members of the East Heights Garden Club opened it to visitors by cleaning, painting, making needed repairs with help from their husbands, and gathering donated period furnishings from area residents. When the house opened in 1971, Garden Club members served as volunteer hostesses and helped guide visitors to the park. The home stands as a memorial to Elvis's humble beginnings and to the vision and dedication of the East Heights Garden Club. From 1935 to 1948, Vernon, Gladys, and Elvis Presley lived in a small low-income East Tupelo community bound together by family, friends, faith, work, and mutual need. Women sewed in shirt factories, men drove trucks or worked in fields, and some families relied on wives, children, churches, or the Works Progress Administration. Front porches were gathering places, children traded comic books and movie star magazines and went to ten-cent movies, and moon pies and RC Colas were favorite treats. Adults watched over neighborhood children, church revivals filled summer nights, and gospel singing, clapping, shouting, and "Amen!" carried through the neighborhood. Though born in poverty on the other side of the tracks, Elvis's early life was enriched by family love and the goodness of his neighborhood, and the charity his family received helped instill the generosity that marked his adult life.
