Elvis Presley is a name known everywhere around the world, but his childhood wasn’t easy. Elvis wasn’t born a star.

The “King of Rock and Roll” is the perfect example of a ‘rags to riches’ story people love.

He was born Elvis Aaron Presley on January 8, 1935, in Tupelo, Mississippi to Gladys Love and Vernon Presley in a two-room shotgun house his father built.

Elvis was actually a twin but his twin brother, Jesse Garon, was delivered 35 minutes before him. He was stillborn.

The tragedy made Elvis an only child, making the close bond he had with his parents way more special.

The Presley family didn’t have a lot living in a two-room shotgun house located in one of the roughest towns in northern Mississippi.

But they had each other, and even if they were strapped for money, the parents believed that God had greater plans for Elvis.

“Certain things happened which convinced me that God had given my wife and me a very special child for whom He had some very special plans,” Vernon Presley revealed to Good Housekeeping.

Vernon struggled to hold down a job so the family often turned to neighbors and government food assistance.

Elvis was just three when Vernon was found guilty of altering a check which had him serveing eight months in jail.

Gladys and Elvis had to move in with relatives. When Vernon returned home, he couldn’t hold down a steady job because of his record.

Despite the financial hardships, Elvis was very close with his parents. Religion was the one constant thing they had.

Elvis’ childhood was hard but religion kept the family together. His father was a deacon at the Assembly of God Church where the family would go to every Sunday.

But it wasn’t just God that Elvis found as he was inspired by gospel music.

Young Elvis enjoyed standing and watching the choir, singing along with them while they had no idea that he would become a star someday.

The pastor even gave Elvis guitar lessons after he received his first guitar on his 11th birthday.

From there, his love for music increased and he took his guitar with him everywhere, including to school, where he would play and sing during lunchtime.

His guitar came in handy when they moved to Memphis. It’s one of the most famous music towns in the United States.

Elvis was finding his passion for music, but was having trouble fitting in since he stood out at a young age.

He was bullied for being a “momma’s boy” as Peter Guralnick wrote in Last Train to Memphis: The Rise of Elvis Presley.

Elvis stuck out more after growing out his signature sideburns and styling his hair with oil and Vaseline.

He was inspired by Memphis’ music scene so he began wearing flashy clothes, which distanced him more from his classmates.

Elvis was a shy teen so nobody knew that he could sing.

But all that was about to change after Elvis graduated high school.

That’s when he decided to give his mother a very special gift.

After graduating from high school, Elvis visited The Memphis Recording Service, home of the Sun Records label.

He made a demo of “My Happiness” and “That’s When Your Heartaches Begin” for about $4. It was a record for his mother Gladys as a belated birthday gift.

Elvis also wanted to know what he sounded like on a record and to see what it took to become a professional singer.

The studio session didn’t catch anyone’s attention. It wasn’t until Elvis made a second demo a year later that people took notice.

It was Sam Phillips, the owner of Sun Records, who heard Elvis’ demo and so he wanted to hear more.

He called Elvis into the studio to sing “Without You” but didn’t like the way it was sung.

But still, Phillips was impressed enough to team Elvis up with local musicians Scotty Moore (guitar) and Bill Black (bass).

He wanted to see if they could come up with something special.

It was a sped-up version of Arthur “Big Boy” Crudup’s “That’s All Right” that Phillips found the sound he wanted.

This was Elvis’ first single.

After “That’s All Right” played on the radio, Elvis’ career took off. He remained close to his parents, even though his career kept him away for months at a time, which was hard for all but he was an icon.

As a young boy, he promised to take care of them financially and even buy them a big house.

Elvis kept his word, purchasing Graceland in 1957 and moving his parents into the 14-acre, colonial-style mansion.

His fame grew but his bond with his parents didn’t change. They still had an active role in their son’s overnight fame.

As Elvis became more popular, his father looked after his finances and even joined him on tour. He was even an extra in some of his son’s films.

When Elvis was a child, Vernon had no idea that he would go on to become one of the biggest names in music, but he did know his son was special.

“I don’t mean that I knew that Elvis was going to be famous because at that time the idea never crossed my mind … I only knew that Elvis had a contribution to make one way or another, that the Lord seemed to have His hand on him,” Vernon shared with Good Housekeeping.

While Vernon was active in his son’s professional life, Elvis was closer with his mother Gladys.

She was proud of her son’s success but was also protective of her only child and she feared for his life because of his fame.

During one of his shows, girls started throwing themselves at Elvis, so Gladys picked them off, saying, “Why you trying to kill my boy?”, as per The New Zealand Herald.

But it was a secret about Gladys that changed everyone’s perspective on Elvis.

Gladys struggled with her son’s fame so she turned to alcohol to cope with it all.

She drank heavily and soon suffered from undiagnosed hepatitis. Her condition got worse while Elvis was serving in the U.S. Army in Germany.

Elvis was then granted emergency leave to be with his mother.

Sadly, two days after his arrival in Memphis, Gladys passed away on August 14, 1958 from heart failure at the age of 46.

Her passing had a huge impact on Elvis.

Gladys’ death broke Elvis. He found it difficult time coming to terms with her untimely passing, and he grieved.

“I have never seen anyone as sad as Elvis was,” his friend Judy Spreckels shared in Peter Guralnick’s Careless Love: The Unmaking of Elvis Presley.

Elvis and Vernon were so shaken up by Gladys’ death. They were desperate to hold on to anything that reminded them of her.

According to Daily Express, the father and son kept a broken piece of windowpane which Gladys had fallen into.

Elvis and Vernon wanted to keep her memory alive in any way possible as her passing was too painful for them.

Gladys was buried at Memphis’ Forest Hill Cemetery in a public ceremony with her headstone adorned with a cross.

Six years later, Elvis replaced the grave marker after making some changes to it, including the words “Sunshine Of Our Home.”

Gladys’ death was difficult, but tragedy was about to strike the Presley family again.

This time it would be tougher.

19 years later, Elvis passed away on August 16, 197, at the age of 42. His official cause of death was ruled cardiac arrest, but rumors spread that it was a result of the King’s addiction to drugs.

Doctors would later say that his death was likely brought on by his drug addiction.

Elvis’ funeral was held at Graceland on August 18. There were around 80,000 people in attendance.

He was buried in Forest Hill Cemetery right next to his mother but fans weren’t about to let the King rest in peace.

A few months after his death, fans tried to steal his body. Vernon then had the remains of his son and wife moved to Graceland’s Meditation Garden in October 1977 for obvious security reasons.

Gladys’ grave marker went into storage with over 1.5 million other items. It remained there for a very long time until 2018.

When the headstone was taken out of storage, what was revealed surprised fans around the world.

Gladys’ grave marker remained untouched until Angie Marchese, Graceland’s vice president of archives and exhibits, put it on public display.

So after being hidden away for 41 years, Marchese brought it out of storage and displayed it for the public.

But Marchese did not advertise the unveiling, wanting to keep it special for the late Gladys and to honor what Elvis wanted.

“We decided we didn’t want to make a lot of fanfare about it,” Marchese told The Commercial Appeal. “It was just done to honor Elvis’ mom and to fulfill what we think would have been his wish.”

It did just that, with the grave displayed on the 60th anniversary of Elvis’ mother’s death. Her grave sits in Graceland’s Meditation Garden, outside of the mansion near Elvis’ grave.

The headstone’s reveal started a media frenzy. What was it that captivated fans?

Gladys’ headstone didn’t just read “Sunshine Of Our Home”, the one Elvis changed it to six years after her death.

The King even added a Star of David. On the upper left side of the marker, there’s a Star of David designed by Elvis, and on the left side, there’s a cross.

Rumors about Elvis’ heritage have been discussed for a long time, but nothing was ever confirmed.

But with the Star of David and a sign proclaiming “Gladys’ Jewish heritage”, the singer’s Jewish roots were in question once more.

During his career and after his untimely death, rumors began circulating about his Jewish heritage.

The public unveiling of his mother’s updated headstone and the sign “Gladys’ Jewish heritage”, brought the mystery one step closer to being solved.

“There was a lot of mystery surrounding it,” Marchese said according to The Times of Israel. “The star is on it, so it answered a lot of questions that were out there.”

Elvis’ Jewish roots came from his maternal great-great-grandmother, Nancy Burdine, but not much is known about her.

Ancestry.com states that she was born in Mississippi in 1826 and died in 1897. It is possible that at the time of the American Revolution, her family immigrated to America from Lithuania.

Nancy’s great-granddaughter was Gladys Love Smith, Elvis’ mother.

That makes Gladys and Elvis Jewish since under Jewish law, religion is passed down directly from the mother.

Elvis’ Jewish heritage wasn’t known, but it wasn’t exactly kept a secret.

Presley’s father was German and his mother Gladys was believed to be Scots-Irish with some French and Cherokee as well.

Elvis was a unique kind, and Elaine Dundy, who wrote the biography Elvis and Gladys, put it best saying, “When you overlay all this with his circumstances, social conditioning and religious upbringing—specifically his Southern poor white, First Assembly of God upbringing, you have the enigma that was Elvis.”

So why did Elvis include the Star of David on Gladys’ headstone? After all, he was a bit of everything, and he was raised in the Assembly of God Church where he went to every Sunday with the family.

Graceland’s vice president of archives and exhibits Angie Marchese says she isn’t sure either, but that “the Jewish faith gave him comfort when he was seeking answers”.

Elvis was trying to find comfort after his mother’s passing. He was so close with Gladys.

When his mother passed away in the late ‘50s, Elvis began seeking answers from other religions.

His hairdresser, Larry Geller, sparked his interest in meditation, yoga, spirituality, and religion. The first time they met, the two had a three-hour conversation about spirituality.

“Right away he wanted to know about the soul, Do we have a soul? Where do we come from? Do we survive this life?” Geller shared with the Elvis Information Network website.

Elvis asked, “‘Why me? Why me. Why was I plucked from all of the millions and millions of lives to be Elvis? Do we really have souls.? Where do we really come from? I’ve got to find out.’

He said, ‘I’m a believer. I believe in God. I believe in the afterlife. But I want to know why?’”, Geller shared in an interview with the Elvis Information Network website.

He brought Elvis books on every major religion in the world, to help expand his knowledge. The King started reading daily and adding books to his personal library.

Elvis began finding answers to life’s most challenging questions in those books, and he was really interested in it all.

The singer was an intellectual and he found his answers through religions. Who would have known that the King was an intellectual?

“He was always searching for answers as to why he was chosen to be who he was,” Marchese said via The Times of Israel. “I think he found some of those answers through different religions.”

So along with other religions, Elvis explored his Jewish roots, never even trying to hide his Judaism from the world.

During his final years, the King was usually photographed wearing a necklace with the Star of David, plus another one with the Hebrew word “chai”, a word which means life.

The chai necklace was pretty flashy since Elvis designed it with 17 diamonds.

The necklace is kept in a cabinet at Graceland right next to the keys of his 1955 pink Cadillac.

Elvis grew up practicing Christianity and attending the Assembly of God Church, but showed interest in many religions later on.

This explains his wore Jewish necklaces. And n addition to the Star of David and chai necklaces, he also wore a cross. The King was trying to cover all of his bases.

“He would often make a joke, ‘I don’t want to get left out of heaven on a technicality,’” Marchese said, according to The Times of Israel. “So he would wear a Star of David, a chai and he would also wear a cross. He wanted to keep all his bases covered.”

Elvis did wear Jewish necklaces, but they weren’t the only way that he identified with his Judaism.

The singer generously gave to Jewish organizations in Memphis during his lifetime. One of them was the Memphis Jewish Community Center, which honored the King’s donation with a plaque.

That plaque hangs in Graceland today for fans to see.

The King’s personal library, one of his greatest points of pride, included lots of books on Judaism and Jewish history.

Even though the family was a member of the Assembly of God Church, Elvis grew up around Judaism.

The whole family lived in an apartment right below the family of Rabbi Alfred Fruchter. He was the first principal of the Memphis Hebrew Academy.

On an episode of the Tablet magazine podcast, the Rabbi’s son, Harold, shared how his family was close with Elvis’ family and how his mother was friendly with Gladys.

Harold also narrated how Elvis served as their “Shabbos goy”, what they call a non-Jew who performs household tasks for observant Jews during the Sabbath.

They used Elvis to help them observe the Sabbath.

According to Harold, his parents didn’t know that Elvis was Jewish.

“If they had, they would never have considered asking him to be a Shabbos goy,” Fruchter said via The Times of Israel.

Elvis did have Jewish roots, hence why he added a new marker to Gladys’ gravestone featuring a cross, “Sunshine Of Our Home”, and the Star of David.

But the King’s headstone was much more simple.

His grave marker, near Gladys’ in Graceland’s Meditation Garden, features a cross, like the one Gladys’ original gravestone had.

Who knows if his headstone will be changed after this discovery about his Jewish roots.

Elvis was one of the greatest icons of the 20th century, but his personal life was kept a secret.

Rumors continued to circulate about his heritage even over 40 years after his death. But the world finally got answers!

When Gladys’ headstone was put on to public display, the mystery was solved. Her headstone revealed that the King, her son, was Jewish.

What other facts about Elvis will we learn in the future?