Video: Owner Of Last East Tupelo Home Elvis Lived In Will Give It Away, If It Is Moved

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TUPELO, MISS. (WCBI) – The wood frame house at 1241 Kelly Street doesn’t stand out from others in the East Tupelo neighborhood, but it has a unique history.

“The Presleys lived here and I spent a night or two in this house with Elvis,” said Guy Harris, who was a boyhood friend of Elvis, and he says this house is the last East Tupelo home the Presleys lived in before moving to Memphis in 1948.

Harris remembers carefree days playing with his friend in these streets.

“These streets weren’t paved back in those days, they were dirt streets, they would bring a grader along, we would play in those streets, play ball and that kind of stuff,” Harris said.

The house has been vacant for more than a year. It is owned by Buddy Palmer, who also owns Palmer’s Supermarket. He bought the property, to expand his store’s parking lot. Recently, the house was listed on Ebay, but there were no buyers.

Now, Palmer wants to give the house away.

“We’re trying our best to come up with a place to keep it, or I’m going to have to demolish it,” Palmer said.

Ideally, Palmer would like someone to have the house moved, to another location in East Tupelo, where he believes it could be another stop for tourists who come to see where the Elvis story started.

“I think the birthplace talks about the early Elvis and that’s where he really got his music from black music, the country music, which, and church , combining all of those it was the rockabilly deal Elvis was a part of it, so it’s very important the environment he grew up in, that’s what formed his music taste I believe,” he said.
Preliminary work on the expansion of the parking lot is underway, so there is still a small window of time for someone to step in and save an early piece of Elvis history. The parking lot expansion is part of a rebranding of the supermarket. Palmer’s will soon be known as “Shopper’s Value Foods” If you would like more information on the Elvis house, call Buddy Palmer at 662 255 1454.