Welcome to the Conspiracy Series.
This week we will dive into the conspiracy that Elvis Presley, the King, is still alive.
In this theory, I feel like I don’t need to explain who Elvis Presley is. At this point in your life, if you don’t know who Elvis Presley is you just need to google it.
Elvis Presley “died” on August 16 in 1977 in Memphis, TN. He apparently died of a heart attack. Elvis was only 42 when he passed away.
Behind the Conspiracy
Hours after Elvis “died”, a lookalike was seen purchasing one-way tickets from Memphis to Buenos Aires. He used the name Jon Burrows, the name which Elvis used when staying at hotels.
Presley’s funeral is where most of the conspiracy began. There is footage from the funeral of the pallbearers struggling to carry Presley’s 900-pound casket, which people think is because instead of Presley’s body in the casket, there was a cooling system and a wax figure resembling Presley. An article from MentalFloss even claimed that Presley’s own cousin thought the body looked odd. He thought that his hairline was off and his hands were abnormally smooth.
From the funeral onwards, the conspiracy continued to spiral as more sightings were claimed.
The next sighting is from a photograph taken in December of the same year Elvis passed. A tourist of Graceland, Elvis’s property, took a photo of Presley’s pool house and noticed a figure in the background.
The next sightings were in the ’80s in Kalamazoo, Michigan. A woman and her daughter both claimed they saw Presley on two different occasions, one being at Burger King, Presley’s favorite fast-food chain.
As the years go on, these theories continue to get a little weird. One even claimed that Elvis was an extra in ‘Home Alone’. One theory goes as far as to say that Presley faked his death to go into witness protection after he was recruited by the FBI to take down a criminal organization. Apparently they found out he was a mole and he had to fake his death to stay alive.
Debunking
Most of these sightings have reasoning as to why they aren’t Elvis, but some still remain unanswered.
Elvis could not have flown to Buenos Aires from Memphis, as the Memphis Airport did not have international flights in 1977. Also, the theory that he was in Home Alone is false as well. The extra was tracked down and was confirmed by his son that it was him in the movie scene.
What I Think
This is the first conspiracy theory I’ve gone over where I haven’t found an insane amount of evidence proving it wrong. While two of the sightings were proven to be false, the rest were not. Honestly, on this one, I am going to say that I feel like this one could be true. Especially with the statements from his cousin at the funeral and the weight of the casket. That’s my top piece of evidence for this theory. I think that this theory could make sense and that it is not talked about as much as some of the other clearly fake conspiracies. Presley was probably the most famous person around the time he died. Maybe he was overwhelmed with the stage life and decided he wanted time out of the always watching eye of the media. To me it makes sense.
Overall I give this conspiracy a 4 out of 5 stars. It’s believable. I just wish it had a bit more evidence. Most of the sightings and theories have not been debunked which I think is impressive. It’s not perfect, but it’s better than I anticipated. I enjoyed researching this one.
Come back next week to talk about Princess Diana and the conspiracy behind her sudden death.