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"Colonel" Tom Parker (born Andreas Cornelius van Kuijk on June 26, 1909 in Breda, Netherlands – died on January 21, 1997 in Las Vegas, Nevada), was an American entertainment impresario known best as the manager of Elvis Presley.
Finding Elvis
Parker's involvement in the music industry began as a music promoter in the late 1940s, working with such country music stars as Minnie Pearl, Hank Snow, and Eddy Arnold, as well as film star Tom Mix. During this time he received the honorary title of "Colonel" in 1948 from Jimmie Davis, the governor of Louisiana. His involvement with Elvis Presley began when he booked Presley as the opening act for Canadian singer Snow.
On August 18, 1955, Parker became Presley's manager officially, by contract, and in November he convinced RCA Records to buy Presley out from Sun Records for $35,000, big money for its time. With his first RCA single, Heartbreak Hotel, Presley graduated from rumor to bona-fide recording star.
It's debatable whether Presley would have become the superstar he became without Parker, and it's likewise debatable to what extent Parker's management of the King of Rock and Roll was Svengali-like. Parker held the reins of Presley's singing and acting career for the rest of Presley's life and was said to be instrumental in virtually every business decision that Presley made—including his decision to cut back on recording and stop touring after returning from his stint in the United States Army in 1960, in favor of a film career (from 1960 to 1967-68) that was lucrative in terms of his bank account but, to many critics and no few fans, bankrupting in terms of Presley's music quality.
It took the energetic 1968 television special, Elvis, and a subsequent series of stellar recording sessions in Memphis, Tennessee, to restore Elvis Presley's musical reputation. To his credit, though it's open as to whether he was allowed much choice in the matter, Parker allowed both to happen with little impediment.
Surviving Elvis
After Presley's death in 1977, Parker became embroiled in legal disputes with the singer's estate and with his daughter, Lisa Marie Presley. Parker eventually agreed in 1983 to sell his masters of some of Presley's major recordings to RCA for $2 million and to drop any claims he had to Presley's estate. Parker moved to Las Vegas in 1980 and worked as an "entertainment adviser" for Hilton Hotels, but the disputes with the Presley estate didn't alienate him entirely from his most legendary client. Parker appeared at posthumous events honoring Presley, such as the ceremonies marking the tenth anniversary of the singer's death and the 1993 issuing of the United States Postal Service stamp honoring the King of Rock and Roll.
Presley's enduring legend and the continuing, often obsessive interest in him, provoked Parker in 1993 to say on the record, "I don't think I exploited Elvis as much as he's being exploited today."
Personal life
As Presley's fame grew, people became interested in Parker as well. For a while he lied about his early years, claiming to have been born in Huntington, West Virginia and that he had run away at an early age to join a circus run by an uncle. The truth about his early years was revealed when his family in the Netherlands recognized him in photographs of him standing next to Elvis; it was confirmed when Parker tried to avert a lawsuit in 1982 by asserting that he was a Netherlands citizen.
He was actually born in Breda, Netherlands. Still carrying his baptism name, Andreas Cornelius van Kuijk fled his native land at about the age of 18, joined the United States Army, then changed his name to Tom Parker and became part of the circus world some time after leaving the Army. He also worked as a dogcatcher and a pet cemetery proprietor in Tampa, Florida, in the 1940s.
Elvis fans have speculated that the reason he never performed abroad, which would likely have been a highly lucrative proposition, may have been that Parker was worried that as a non-citizen, he would not have been able to acquire a US passport, and may have been deported from the United States upon filing his application; in addition, applying for the citizenship required for a US passport would likely have exposed his carefully concealed foreign birth (although as an army veteran and spouse of a US citizen he would have been entitled to US citizenship). Some have argued that the former argument neglects the fact that Presley toured Canada in 1957 with concerts in Toronto, Ottawa, and Vancouver; still, at the time of these concerts, crossing the US--Canada border did not require a passport.
Parker died on January 21, 1997, in Las Vegas, Nevada, at the age of 87.
References
- Elvis and the Colonel Dirk Vellenga (1989) (ISBN 0-44-20392-9) reveals much of his Dutch background, the circus-business and his way of doing business.
- The Colonel: The Extraordinary Story of Colonel Tom Parker and Elvis Presley - Alanna Nash (2003) (Simon & Schuster - ISBN 0743213017) - Award winning story by a Society of Professional Journalists' National Member of the Year. Website: *
External links
- * "Colonel" Tom Parker at findagrave.com
1909 births | 1997 deaths | Elvis Presley | Dutch people
Colonel Tom Parker | Dries van Kuijk | Паркер, Том | Tom Parker
"Colonel Tom Parker"