Source: http://engl4110.jeteraaron.com/tag/elvis/Sam Wallace Kickstarts Elvis Presley
February 17, 2016 - Leave a comment
It all started when my dad told me my great grandfather, Sam Wallace, had a catfish eating contest with Elvis Presley. That’s right, a cat fish eating contest with the king of rock and roll! Who won you ask? Well Elvis of course!
Well actually, it started when I asked my dad about his record collection. In our basement, my dad organized all of his records on these shelves in alphabetical order. There’s hundreds of them. Of course, he had a record player to go with his collection. Not the new kind that is an all in one, but the ones you have to turn before playing. It’s 100% manual, no electricity needed. The record player, specifically is the “His Masters Voice” record player.
Then after a few years, I asked him about Wallace again, and he told me he is in the Georgia Music Hall of Fame. (His name is under the row “1993”) He drove me to Discover Mills, a mall in Sugarloaf, Georgia, which has a list of names from Music Hall of Fame located all throughout the mall. Sure enough there was his name, written on a plaque with golden letters. That’s something to brag about. It’s crazy that thousands of people pass that plaque and would never know that name is my great grandfathers.
My whole family is obsessed with music, all of my family collects records, go to concerts. Almost any song that’s playing they can all tell me the name of the singer, the band they’re in, the band members, and the year it was released. It’s pretty crazy. My own cousin is in a bandSam and Elvis, MammaBear, for those who are interested. My brother works for Live Nation, the company that puts together concerts. He gets to go to so many concerts for free, and hang out with the band members. He even got Alisa Xayalith’s (lead singer from The Naked and Famous) phone number. Could she be my step sister? Maybe! My brother also told me that when he met his favorite band, Weezer, they bought him an electric guitar just to sign it for him.
Buy anyway, back to granddad. My dad showed me a picture of Wallace, shaking hands with Elvis, so I figured they were buddies or something. Well that was true, but what I didn’t know was he actually helped Elvis start his career. Elvis would not have been as popular as he was without my great granddad! Isn’t that crazy?!
Archive Binder
My dad put together this binder with all of these papers, pictures, newspaper clippings all about my great granddad. There’s the original version of his will. My dad saved all of it, which I think is pretty cool.
He worked for a record company, so he was really popular, which is why he is in the music hall of fame. There are tons of pictures in the binder with him meeting celebrities, and he was friends with all of them. My great grandfather was a pretty popular guy. I never would have known either.
t’s not every day you get to brag about your greatfather, who had a catfish Newspaper of Samreating contest with the kind of rock, help started his career as one of the most famous rock gods in history. It shows that you never know about your families past unless you ask. Props to my dad for keeping all of this together! And props to my great granddad for helping Elvis! He did the music world a great deed.
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) Wallace and members of his family. Don't know where i found them in the past:
