Elvis’ manager was ‘one of a kind’

By Charles Berberian (aka Chuck Manning), Las Vegas

Tuesday, Jan. 13, 2015 | 2 a.m.

I worked at a radio station here when Elvis was appearing at the Las Vegas Hilton. His manager, Col. Tom Parker, would have all of his vinyl albums delivered to the station. Even then, quite a pile. We had our choice of playing any of his songs; on Sundays, the station was instructed to play all gospel songs by Elvis.

We were told to introduce the song with, “Elvis is now playing at the Las Vegas Hilton” and come out of the song with the same: “That was Elvis, now playing at the Las Vegas Hilton.” Usually a station only plays 60- or 30-second commercials, but in this case, Parker, as per his instructions, was being charged for the time from when we first mentioned Elvis to the end of the song and mentioning Elvis at the Hilton again. This could amount to two, three, four minutes of air time being charged to the Elvis account. Unheard of in all my years in broadcasting.

Col. Parker was “one of a kind.”