1. Elvis Presley was one of the highest paid actors in Hollywood for a number of years in the nineteen fifties. He acted in thirty-one movies.
2. In nineteen fifty-eight, just as he finished making the movie “King Creole,” Elvis received notice that he had to serve in the United States Army. He was stationed in Germany where he lived in a large house anddated a lot of beautiful women.
3. One young girl he met in Germany was Priscilla Beaulieu, the daughter of an Army officer. She was fourteen years old. Later, after Elvis had finished his army service, she came to live with him in Memphis. They married in nineteen sixty-seven, when she was twenty-one years old. He was thirty-two. They became parents nine months later of a baby girl, Lisa Marie.
4. Colonel Parker made sure that songs Elvis had recorded earlier were released during the years he was in the army. So Elvis was just as popular after his military service as he was before it.
5. Elvis Presley won three of the music industry’s highest award, the Grammy. He received the first one in nineteen sixty-seven. It was for “How Great Thou Art,” an album of religious music.
6. Elvis returned to performing live shows in nineteen sixty-nine, in Las Vegas, Nevada. He then traveled around the country performing before huge crowds. He began to take drugs to help him sleep. He gained a lot of weightso he took drugs to help control his weight. And he took extremely strong drugs to reduce pain.
7. Elvis also suffered from the emotional sickness, depression. It became worse after his marriage ended. Elvis never permitted Priscilla to stay with him in Las Vegas or travel with him around the country.
8. He also did not want Priscilla to see other people when he was away from home. And he spent time with other women. Priscilla finally left him in nineteen seventy-two for another man.
9. Elvis Presley released many recordings of his performances during the nineteen seventies. He also enjoyed great success on television. His nineteen seventy-three television show from Hawaii was seen in forty countries by more than one thousand million people.
10. His last record album was called “Moody Blue.” He recorded it in nineteen seventy-six. One of its hit songs was called “Way Down”:
11. Elvis Presley died on August sixteenth, nineteen seventy-seven. First reports said he had a heart attack, but later tests showed many drugs in his body. Experts agree that these drugs probably caused his death.
12. Hundreds of thousands of people still visit his home, Graceland, in Memphis every year. Fans continue to buy his music, making him the most popular recording artist ever. Elvis Presley remains the undisputed King of Rock and Roll.
This program was written by Nancy Steinbach. Rich Kleinfeldt and Steve Ember were the narrators. The producer was Paul Thompson. I’m Faith Lapidus. Listen again next week for another PEOPLE IN AMERICA program in VOA Special English.
Vocabulary
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