May 1, 1967. Elvis Presley and Priscilla Beaulieu stood before 14 friends and family members at the Aladdin Hotel in Las Vegas. The ceremony lasted just eight minutes. Then came a press conference and a reception with about 100 guests.
It was one of the most talked-about weddings of the decade. And now, nearly 60 years later, you can see it up close.
A rare album of 30 original black-and-white photographs from that day is heading to auction on September 21 through Danish auction house Bruun Rasmussen. The album was a personal gift from Elvis and Priscilla to her parents, given as a memento of their wedding day. It has been passed down through the Beaulieu family ever since and has never been offered for sale before.
The photos capture the moments you would want to remember. Priscilla feeding Elvis a bite of wedding cake. The newlyweds posing with his groomsmen. The two of them exchanging rings. Around 10 similar albums were given to other loved ones at the time, but this one is believed to be the first ever put up for sale.
Auction specialist Ludvig Hjorth called Elvis and Priscilla “undoubtedly one of the most iconic couples of the 20th century” and described the album as “extraordinary” documentation of their life together.
The estimated value is DKK 100,000, about $14,600 in U.S. dollars. Bids can already be placed online.
The winning bidder will also receive three private color photographs, believed to be one of a kind, taken at Graceland in the summer of 1968. They show Elvis, Priscilla, and their daughter Lisa Marie, who was born that February, enjoying a day outdoors together.
One of those photos shows Elvis behind the wheel of a golf cart full of kids. On the back of the photo, someone wrote by hand: “Elvis going fast to scare mother.”
Their story had started nearly a decade before that wedding. Elvis met Priscilla in Germany when he was 24 and she was 14. He was already a world-famous star, serving as a private at Ray Barracks. She was the stepdaughter of U.S. Air Force Captain Joseph Beaulieu, stationed nearby at Wiesbaden Air Base.
When Priscilla’s family returned to the United States in 1963, her parents allowed her to move to Graceland at age 17 to finish high school. She was 21, and he was 32, when they finally married.
They divorced in 1973 but remained close, raising Lisa Marie together. Elvis died four years later, in 1977, at age 42.
That handwritten note on the back of a golf cart photo says something, doesn’t it? Even at the height of fame, there were just ordinary summer days at Graceland, a young family, a cart full of kids, and someone trying to make everybody laugh.
