1935 - The Year My Dad And Elvis Were Born

Introduction

This is one of a series of posts about years with significant events that coincide with the number of the Vocal story. I am going to miss many, like Jesse Owens at the 1936 Olympics. According to testimonies Hitler did not snum Owens but his own President did. This does not make Hitler a good man.

So What Is This One About?

My Dad And Me

In 1935 my dad was born, the second of eight children, as well as him, one of his sisters and a brother are still with us. He was among other things a pig farmer (on the side) spent most of his working life as a builder and installed over two thousand post boxes from Anglesey to the Scottish Borders.

I am extremely proud of him and we speak quite a lot but he still can't get the hang of his mobile phone or any kind of computer but can easily drive a manual vehicle, and is brilliant at any physical construction work whether in brick, stone, wood and can also maint window frames perfectly. That is something I never got the hang of.

He showed me how to lay a brick wall, but my limit was digging foundations, mixing concrete and plaster, and breaking stuff that needed smashing.

I helped him, providing brute strength where required but that was about my limit as I am not practically skilled. Those cast iron post boxes are really something else, the distance they go into the ground is about a third their size, and that has to be dug out before they are installed. Guess what I did.

My dad also introduced me to some good music, though I didn't know it at the time. Johnny Cash is a prime example, though I was also shocked to find he was a fan of the German band Neu! and loved the instrumental "Negativeland". I haven't a clue where he heard it. It could have been in the introductory heavy duty drilling before the motorik beat starts.

I'll leave this with my first story about me and my dad:

Elvis Aaron Presley

I am just wondering what I can say about Elvis that may come as news to you. He was born twenty days before my dad, in Tupelo, Mississippi.

Apparently, the first song that I liked (when I was three) was "Hound Dog" by Elvis, according to my Uncle Trevor, so I got into good music fairly early (though I also liked some awful stuff like "Little White Bull" by Tommy Steele). My favourite Elvis Presley song is "I Got Stung" but "The Sun Sessions" is probably my favourite album of his.

I am just reading Stuart Maconie's "Pies And Prejudice" and he recounts the story of a Northern night club manager who called Colonel Tom Parker (Elvis's iron-fisted manager) and offered a hundred thousand pounds for Elvis to play there. Parker said he was fine with that but what about Elvis's fee?

Although responsible for some great music throughout his life, I prefer the music he made before his time in the army. That was just part of him being molded to suit the whims of his manager and "polite society".

There is no doubt he left and incredible legacy, but without Colonel Tom Parker and the army what would he have been like?

I will leave you with some of my Elvis Vocal Stories, although this one is yet another. There is this one that was oddly picked by Vocal as a Top Story, I haven't a clue why.

Then the rest are on this list