Priscilla Presley
Priscilla Ann Presley is an American businesswoman and actress. She was married to singer Elvis Presley from 1967 to 1973. Presley co-founded and served as chair of Elvis Presley Enterprises, the company responsible for developing Graceland as a public attraction. As an actress, she portrayed Jane Spencer in the Naked Gun film series and Jenna Wade on the television series Dallas.
Early life
Priscilla Ann Wagner was born on May 24, 1945, at Brooklyn Naval Hospital in New York City. Her maternal grandfather, Albert Henry Iversen, was originally from Egersund, Norway, and later emigrated to the United States, where he married Lorraine Davis, who was of Scots-Irish and English descent. Their only daughter, Anna Lillian Iversen, later known as Ann, was Priscilla’s mother. Priscilla's biological father, James Frederick Wagner, was a U.S. Navy pilot from Cherrytree Township, Pennsylvania. He married Ann on August 10, 1944. Wagner died in a plane crash on November 3, 1945, when Priscilla was six months old. His brother, Harold Wagner Jr., later served as principal of an American school in Fürstenfeldbruck, Germany.In 1948, Ann married U.S. Air Force officer Paul Beaulieu, a native of Québec, Canada. The couple raised Priscilla, along with half-siblings Donald, Michelle, Jeffrey and twins Thomas and Timothy. Priscilla's surname was legally changed to Beaulieu on April 17, 1950.
Due to her stepfather’s military career, the family relocated frequently. Priscilla later recalled in an interview with The Wall Street Journal, "We moved around a lot, and I didn’t stay in one school long enough to make close friends. I was quite shy when I was young, and I dreaded lunchtime at school. I often ate alone." In 1956, the family settled in Del Valle, Texas, before Beaulieu was reassigned to Wiesbaden, West Germany.
Life in West Germany
Upon arriving in West Germany, the Beaulieu family initially stayed at the Helene Hotel. After three months, the cost proved unsustainable, prompting them to search for a rental property. They eventually moved into a spacious apartment in a "vintage building constructed long before World War I." Shortly after settling in, they discovered that the building also operated as a brothel, but due to limited housing availability, they had little choice but to remain.Life with Elvis
West Germany
On September 13, 1959, Priscilla, then 14, met Elvis Presley, 24, at a party held at his rented villa in Bad Nauheim, West Germany, where he was stationed during his military service. Currie Grant, a U.S. Air Force officer, introduced her. Priscilla met Presley several times after their initial meeting. During one of these early visits, he invited her upstairs to speak privately and shared memories of his mother, Gladys Presley, who had died in August 1958. Before she left, he kissed her goodbye—reportedly her first real kiss. After their fourth date, her father stated that if the relationship was to continue, he wanted to meet Presley in person. Presley agreed and arrived in his Army uniform, accompanied by his father. During the meeting, Priscilla's parents outlined expectations for future visits, including transportation and curfews. Presley responded respectfully and offered reassurances, allowing the relationship to continue under agreed conditions. Thereafter, Priscilla and Presley were frequently together until he departed from West Germany on March 2, 1960.After Elvis left Germany, Priscilla isolated herself for two days, unable to eat or sleep. At school, she was swarmed by reporters asking if he’d called and stating that Nancy Sinatra had met him at the airport. Convinced their relationship was over, Priscilla feared she'd never see him again. Twenty-one days after Elvis left Germany, Priscilla received a phone call in the early hours of the morning. From then on, their communication became sporadic, with calls arriving unexpectedly after long gaps.
Move to Graceland
In February 1962, after months without contact, Elvis called Priscilla and suggested she visit him in Los Angeles. She was unsure her father would agree, but Elvis made repeated calls to reassure her parents. He accepted every condition: waiting until summer break, providing a first-class round-trip ticket, sending a detailed itinerary, ensuring constant chaperoning, and requiring daily letters home. Priscilla marked off each day until the visit. When she arrived, she was met by Joe Esposito and driven to Elvis's home. Soon after, Elvis invited her to join him on a trip to Las Vegas—breaking the agreed itinerary. To avoid detection, Priscilla prewrote letters and arranged for them to be mailed from Los Angeles while she was away.During the Las Vegas visit, Priscilla began experimenting with amphetamines and sleeping pills to keep pace with Elvis’s nocturnal lifestyle. After a second visit at Christmas, her parents agreed to let her relocate to Memphis permanently in mid-March 1963, two months before her eighteenth birthday. As part of the arrangement, Elvis was expected to marry her. Priscilla enrolled at the Immaculate Conception Cathedral School, an all-girls Catholic institution, and initially lived with Elvis’s father and stepmother. She spent increasing time at Graceland with Elvis’s grandmother, Minnie Mae Presley, gradually moving her belongings in until she was living there full-time.
Priscilla was eager to accompany Elvis to Hollywood, but he repeatedly told her he was too busy and asked her to remain in Memphis. During that period, she read reports of an affair between Elvis and his Viva Las Vegas co-star Ann-Margret. She confronted him, and he dismissed the stories as publicity-driven rumours, urging her not to trust the press. Over the following years, Elvis had multiple intimate relationships with co-stars, though he denied each of them to Priscilla. She was eventually permitted to visit him in Hollywood, but her stays were brief.
Marriage and pregnancy
Shortly before Christmas 1966, Elvis proposed to Priscilla, reportedly prompted by Colonel Tom Parker's reminder of RCA's "morals clause" in his record contract. In a 1973 interview with Ladies' Home Journal, Priscilla recalled that they were happy to live together, but "at that time, it wasn't nice for people to live together". Accounts of Elvis's attitude toward marriage vary: his cook Alberta and friend Marty Lacker described him as reluctant and upset about not having a choice, while others, including Esposito, claimed he was excited to marry Priscilla.In her memoir Elvis and Me, Priscilla described Elvis as passionate but insistent that they wait until marriage before having intercourse, stating, "I'm not saying we can't do other things. It's just the actual encounter. I want to save it." Priscilla said in her autobiography that she was a virgin when she married, and she and Elvis did not have sex until their wedding night. Biographer Suzanne Finstad disputed this, suggesting Priscilla had been sexually active earlier, including with Elvis in Germany.
The couple married on May 1, 1967, at the Aladdin Hotel in Las Vegas. The ceremony, arranged by Parker for publicity, lasted eight minutes and was followed by a press conference and a $10,000 breakfast reception attended by representatives from MGM, RCA, and the William Morris Agency.
After the reception, Elvis and Priscilla honeymooned briefly in Palm Springs before returning to Memphis on May 4. They spent three weeks at their private ranch near the Mississippi border, largely alone, though some members of Elvis's inner circle joined them. To mend relationships, the couple hosted a second reception at Graceland on May 29 for those not invited to the wedding.
Priscilla soon discovered she was pregnant. Concerned that it might disrupt their newfound intimacy, she considered an abortion, but she and Elvis ultimately decided against it. Their daughter, Lisa Marie Presley, was born on February 1, 1968 — exactly nine months after their wedding.
Separation and divorce
While Elvis was filming Live a Little, Love a Little, Priscilla began private dance lessons and developed a brief romantic relationship with her instructor, referred to as "Mark" in her memoir Elvis and Me. She later expressed regret. Despite affairs on both sides, the early years of their marriage were reportedly happy. However, following Elvis's 1968 television special, his career resurged, and he spent increasing time touring and performing in Las Vegas, while Priscilla remained at home with their daughter.Encouraged by Elvis, Priscilla took up karate to share his interests and occupy her time. In 1968 she saw Mike Stone for the first time during her second honeymoon in Hawaii. In 1972, she met instructor Mike Stone backstage at one of Elvis's concerts and began an affair. Nevertheless the year 1972 is not confirmed by Mike Stone who wrote that he met Priscilla for the second time at a karate event at Bolsa Chica High School on May 15, 1971. She later wrote, "I still loved Elvis, greatly, but over the next few months, I knew I would have to make a crucial decision regarding my destiny." According to her memoir, Elvis later summoned her to his hotel suite and "forcefully made love to me... 'This is how a real man makes love to his woman'". In a later interview, Priscilla said she regretted her choice of words, calling it an overstatement. Nevertheless, according to Jerry Schilling, Priscilla and Elvis talked together in his dressing room, not in his suite.
Priscilla reflected that Elvis's attempt at reconciliation came too late and lacked sensitivity. She cited his earlier comment that he had "never been able to make love to a woman who had a child" and described the emotional toll of their sexual dysfunction: "I am beginning to doubt my own sexuality, as a woman. My physical and emotional needs were unfulfilled." She concluded, "This was not the gentle, understanding man I grew to love." Years later, on Loose Women, Priscilla confirmed that she and Elvis did sleep together after Lisa Marie was born.
The couple separated on February 23, 1972, and filed for legal separation on July 26. Priscilla sued Elvis for fraud to reopen the divorce by default in May 1973. The divorce was finalized on October 9, 1973.
Priscilla and Elvis agreed to share custody of Lisa Marie. She received a $725,000 cash settlement, spousal and child support, 5% of Elvis's new publishing companies, and half the proceeds from the sale of their Beverly Hills home. Initially, the settlement had been smaller, but after consulting new lawyers, Priscilla revised her requests, asserting that Elvis could afford more. The couple remained close, leaving the courthouse hand-in-hand on the day their divorce was finalized.