Who is this with Elvis?

[Winston]

1951_1.1.jpg

[galaxie]

Bobby Smith . . . who was seven years younger than Elvis. Gene was about the same length (less than 2 inches shorter).

[drjohncarpenter]

After some discussion I concluded it's his cousin Gene Smith. Note your image is reversed.

Billy Smith over on facebook "The Official Memphis Mafia Group" is saying this is Gene, not Bobby. I've had it as Bobby all these years
So it's really Gene? https://www.facebook.com/groups/1315238121887231/

The FB group is private, unfortunately. But I've changed my attribution.

In 1951:

- Bobby James Smith was about ten (born 8-01-1941).
- Tony Eugene "Gene" Smith was sixteen (born 11-28-1934).

This is why I always felt the other fellow was Bobby. But Billy would know better than any of us if that was his older brother.


Also, I can see the face more closely resembles Gene, as this 1956 photo makes clear:





With cousin Gene Smith, actor Nick Adams on plane bound for Memphis - Saturday, September 22, 1956





With cousin Tony Eugene "Gene" Smith, Loew's State photo booth, Memphis - circa 1951



https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/102638587/tony-eugene-smith
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/76162337/bobby-james-smith

[Winston]

Thanks a lot to all of you.

[drjohncarpenter]

Thanks a lot to all of you.

Correct answers optional.

[galaxie]

Bobby. You don't need glasses to see this is not Gene. Or, maybe you do.

[galaxie]

Elvis Presley and Bobby Smith

By Billy Smith

My brother, Bobby, got run over down in front of Graceland That was in '61. I guess Bobby was about nineteen or twenty. He was running across the road. He'd been talking to some friends, and he was coming back across, and a kid who wasn't much older than Bobby came out of the side-road and down Highway 51.

He'd been drinking and he claimed he didn't see him. He hit Bobby dead-on. The bumper caught him and threw him up over the hood, and then he rolled on across. It crushed both of his legs, and broke his cheekbone, and cut him up a little. He had some internal bleeding, but it was mostly his legs.

Somebody took a picture of him on the stretcher. It looks like a slab. My daddy was there, right behind his head. And Elvis was there with a real funny look on his face, sort of a mixture of pity and disgust. My brother looks dead in that picture. It tore him up pretty bad. After that, he tried working a couple of places, but his legs were so brittle he couldn't stand long.

He got married a couple of times. He would have loved a family, loved kids but, somehow or other, it didn't just work. He couldn't hold a job and the women, naturally, resented that. Finally, he got all wrapped up with a girl named Bonnie Allen. She ditched him for someone else and that messed him up even more. He decided that life had just tumed against him.

On September 13, 1968, I got a call. Bobby had taken rat poison. I got him to drink mineral oil, to throw up, and then I said, 'You need to go to the hospital right now'. At first, he refused to go. Finally, we talked him into it. They pumped his stomach and they wanted to keep him overnight, but he wouldn't stay. So he went back home and, sometime during that night, he passed away. He was twenty-seven, almost twenty-eight. It was so sad. Just pitiful. That was a rough time, boy.

Elvis Presley and Travis Smith tried to keep 19-year-old Bobby Smith's spirits up on the night on March 4, 1961 at Methodist Hospital.

Picture:

Elvis and his cousin, Bobby Smith in the photo booth at Loew's State Theater in Memphis 1951.

1951 at Loew's State Theater photo booth Elvis at age 16 with cousin Bobby Smith 1941-1968.jpg

[drjohncarpenter]

Bobby. You don't need glasses to see this is not Gene. Or, maybe you do.

You've been stewing on this topic for two years, then return to post more erroneous information?

My post above from 2020 makes clear why it's Gene, including the photos and Billy Smith's testimony. You know him, he's the guy whose unrelated story you just cut-and-pasted.

Take some time to read what's posted here, then delete your condescending comments.

[galaxie]

and I keep stewing some more years till you realize you are dead wrong

[dyloke]

in fact there are very few pictures of BOBBY but here it s GENE ...

[drjohncarpenter]

in fact there are very few pictures of BOBBY but here it s GENE ...

This seems to be true, at least on the internet.

And of course the member here casting doubt on the identity of the fellow in the photo booth has shared nothing.

One might think my photo comparison is compelling evidence:

Gene Smith_1951 and 1956.png

And the words of Bobby Smith's younger brother Billy agreeing that it's his cousin Gene are even more persuasive.

Whatever.

Bobby Smith led a troubled life, the most notable public incident before his suicide in 1968 was when he was nearly killed crossing the street in front of Graceland. For a long time I wondered when exactly this occurred, and I found it, as reported in one of the local papers.

It was Saturday night, March 4, 1961. Bobby was 19 at the time, and it happened a month after Gene Smith's older brother Junior died in his bed from alcohol poisoning.

610305_Memphis Commercial Appeal_p98.jpg

Badly Hurt

Memphis singer Elvis Presley and Travis Smith tried to keep 19-year-old Bobby Smith's spirits up last night as the accident victim was prepared for surgery at Methodist Hospital. Bobby, first cousin of Elvis and son of Mr. Smith, was seriously injured when hit by a car in front of the Presley mansion —Staff Photo by Justin Westerfield

Memphis Commercial Appeal - Sunday, March 5, 1961
https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/770084482/

And, yes, I again put a better copy of the photo into the newspaper page scan. Here's the original for the guy who wrongly believes I put fake documents in my posts.

610305_Memphis Commercial Appeal_p98_ORIGINAL.jpg

'

[drjohncarpenter]

And . . . actually if you really try, you can find some photos of Bobby Smith.

Some are well-known, but most new to my eyes, and likely yours as well. I found them here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MB5W-hTZHR4

What they show us -- beyond doubt -- is that he is definitely not with Elvis in that 1951 photo booth.


REMEMBERING BOBBY SMITH


'

[tinseltown]

Sorry, but in the first photo you just posted..... this is Billy Smith, not Bobby.

[Mississippi]

Sorry, but in the first photo you just posted..... this is Billy Smith, not Bobby.

Sorry, but Alfred Wertheimer, the photographer wrote:
After a motorcycle ride interrupted by running out of gas, Elvis has a Pepsi on the back patio with his cousin, Bobby Smith, and his father, Vernon.

Alfred Wertheimer, Gregory Martinelly - Elvis ’56 In The Beginning - Random House, UK, Pimlico edition (1994), page 133

Mississippi

[drjohncarpenter]

Sorry, but in the first photo you just posted..... this is Billy Smith, not Bobby.

Sorry, but Alfred Wertheimer, the photographer wrote:
After a motorcycle ride interrupted by running out of gas, Elvis has a Pepsi on the back patio with his cousin, Bobby Smith, and his father, Vernon.

Alfred Wertheimer, Gregory Martinelly - Elvis ’56 In The Beginning - Random House, UK, Pimlico edition (1994), page 133

Mississippi

Besides the Al Wertheimer memory, that face clearly does not belong to Billy Smith, who Elvis later nick-named "ol' marble eyes."


And for someone to question my attribution after the run of photos and information I just shared on this topic is just stupefying.

[Gunter]

Sorry, but in the first photo you just posted..... this is Billy Smith, not Bobby.

Sorry, but Alfred Wertheimer, the photographer wrote:
After a motorcycle ride interrupted by running out of gas, Elvis has a Pepsi on the back patio with his cousin, Bobby Smith, and his father, Vernon.

Alfred Wertheimer, Gregory Martinelly - Elvis ’56 In The Beginning - Random House, UK, Pimlico edition (1994), page 133

Mississippi

Besides the Al Wertheimer memory, that face clearly does not belong to Billy Smith, who Elvis later nick-named "ol' marble eyes."


And for someone to question my attribution after the run of photos and information I just shared on this topic is just stupefying.

It is indeed Bobby. For a long time I also thought it was Billy because there is a striking resemblance, but if one examines the photo's of that day it's clear that there are two boys that look a lot like each other and are both wearing light colored pants and white short sleeve shirts. One is older and bigger than the other and his sleeves are shorter. That is Bobby. And that's the one that is in this picture.

Billy was just little over 13, but looked a lot younger and smaller. He's the one in these pictures:

picture (1).jpg

1956-july-4-phone.jpg

Here you have both brothers:

picture (2).jpg

[tinseltown]

Sorry, but in the first photo you just posted..... this is Billy Smith, not Bobby.

Sorry, but Alfred Wertheimer, the photographer wrote:
After a motorcycle ride interrupted by running out of gas, Elvis has a Pepsi on the back patio with his cousin, Bobby Smith, and his father, Vernon.

Alfred Wertheimer, Gregory Martinelly - Elvis ’56 In The Beginning - Random House, UK, Pimlico edition (1994), page 133

Mississippi

Besides the Al Wertheimer memory, that face clearly does not belong to Billy Smith, who Elvis later nick-named "ol' marble eyes."


And for someone to question my attribution after the run of photos and information I just shared on this topic is just stupefying.

It's not the first time you are wrong with pictures or identifying people's on them (the other thread taking Myrna for Sandi, remember? etc.etc.).
So don't act like you are something special and never make a mistake. And nobody can doubt something you said.
It makes you look foolish and laughable.
Have a nice day.

[drjohncarpenter]

It's not the first time you are wrong with pictures or identifying people's on them (the other thread taking Myrna for Sandi, remember? etc.etc.).
So don't act like you are something special and never make a mistake. And nobody can doubt something you said.
It makes you look foolish and laughable.
Have a nice day.

You just managed to make yourself look worse.

Do better next time.

[dyloke]

And . . . actually if you really try, you can find some photos of Bobby Smith.

Some are well-known, but most new to my eyes, and likely yours as well. I found them here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MB5W-hTZHR4

What they show us -- beyond doubt -- is that he is definitely not with Elvis in that 1951 photo booth.


REMEMBERING BOBBY SMITH


'

SOME RARITIES ACTUALLY THANK YOU VERY MUCH ...

[drjohncarpenter]

SOME RARITIES ACTUALLY THANK YOU VERY MUCH ...

Glad you enjoyed my contributions to this topic.

I like to help out when I can, despite how much it bothers some of our membership.