Elvis fan who witnessed him preventing a fight, has died

[elvis4life]

http://host.madison.com/wsj/news/local/doug_moe/article_9ade9692-66fb-11e0-8751-001cc4c03286.html

Doug Moe: The king of Madison Elvis tales
DOUG MOE | dmoe@madison.com | 608-252-6446 madison.com | (3) Comments | Posted: Thursday, April 14, 2011 7:49 pm

Eric Schumacher, a Madison native who liked music, photography and traveling with his wife, Vikki, died here last week, at 56, after a long illness.

We spoke once, at some length, not about any of his enthusiasms, but rather something that fell into his lap one June night in Madison in 1977.

Just after midnight on June 24, Schumacher picked Elvis Presley up at the airport.

What followed — a story that involved the King of Rock and Roll breaking up a potential fight at a gas station — has passed into both Madison and Elvis lore.

Schumacher was then 22, and a night dispatcher for Checker Cab in Madison. Checker — which would shut down in 1979, with many of its former drivers going on to form Union Cab — owned one limousine, a 1964 Cadillac.

The company had been hired to transport Elvis from the Four Lakes Aviation terminal to the Sheraton Hotel, as well as back and forth from the hotel to the Dane County Coliseum, where Elvis would perform a concert that night.

As soon as the assignment came in, Schumacher's manager at Checker — in the manner of managers everywhere — immediately assigned himself to be Elvis's driver.

It developed, however, that the manager could handle only the hotel-to-Coliseum leg of the assignment. A couple of days before the concert, he asked Schumacher to manage the others.

"I thought it was really cool," Schumacher told me, when we spoke in June 2007.

He had never given an interview about that night, but with the 30th anniversary of the Madison concert approaching, he decided to call.

Schumacher drove the Checker limo to the airport in the company of Madison police detective Thomas J. McCarthy, who had been hired off duty by Madison promoter Herb Frank to help with security for Elvis.

McCarthy rode up front with Schumacher, who drove the limo onto the tarmac at Four Lakes. The Presley plane, arriving from a concert earlier that night in Des Moines, was a bit late. It landed a little past midnight and Elvis got out of the plane wearing sunglasses and the high-collared blue jumpsuit he'd worn at his Iowa performance.

"He was carrying a tumbler and appeared a bit unsteady," Schumacher said.

The singer was accompanied by his girlfriend, his father, his father's girlfriend and a personal security guard.

McCarthy, whom I'd interviewed about the night a couple of years earlier, recalled Elvis being polite, saying "yes, sir" and "no, sir." Schumacher did not remember a lot of conversation in the limo, at least not until he pulled up to a stoplight at the corner of Stoughton Road and East Washington Avenue.

The Skylane Standard Station was on that corner, at 1506 N. Stoughton Road.

Schumacher recalled: "It looked like the attendant was trying to get a reading on the meter to close the station." The attendant was La Follette High School student Keith Lowry, whose father owned the station.

Schumacher said two men were arguing with young Lowry. "They started shoving."

Elvis, watching out the window, said, "I can't let that happen."

McCarthy, the off-duty cop, said, "You're not getting out of the car."

"That isn't right," Elvis said.

The stoplight had changed, and McCarthy turned to Schumacher. "Drive!"

Schumacher took his foot off the brake. Elvis said, "Hold on, boy!"

Are you going to listen to a Madison detective, or the King of Rock and Roll?

Schumacher braked again, and Elvis hopped out. "I remember wondering why he was getting involved," Schumacher said.

Maybe because he knew all three guys would stare dumbfounded once they saw who was coming toward them out of the limo. The fight fizzled. Elvis said, "I found you as enemies. I leave you as friends."

He got back in the limo and laughed. "Did you see the look on their faces?"

State Journal reporter Tom Still assured the episode would become a legend when he wrote about it the next day.

Schumacher went on to work for three decades for the University of Wisconsin, last as a maintenance supervisor at the Pyle Center.

On the 30th anniversary, Schumacher told me he grabbed a towel that Elvis — who would be dead within two months — had used to wipe his face when he got into the limo after the show later that night.

"I kept it for a few years, but I don't know what happened to it."

Still, it was OK. A towel is a towel. Eric Schumacher had the story of a lifetime.

Contact Doug Moe at 608-252-6446 or dmoe@madison.com . His column appears Monday, Wednesday, Friday and Sunday.

[drjohncarpenter]

No Doug, no Moe.

[KiwiAlan]

Hope that car had air-conditioning

[Julian Grant]

Elvis said, "Hold on, boy!" Are you going to listen to a Madison detective, or the King of Rock and Roll?

It's a cool little story but I doubt very much that Elvis said

[fg76]

Hope that car had air-conditioning

That was funny!

[Trevell]

Elvis said, "Hold on, boy!" Are you going to listen to a Madison detective, or the King of Rock and Roll?

It's a cool little story but I doubt very much that Elvis said

I was thinking that at first, but notice that bit isn't in quotes. I think it's more of what the guy might have been thinking than what Elvis actually said.
Great story!

[Suds]

Enjoyable to read the interview. Thanks for posting