Seeing Haley in Mannheim --> October '58 Mystery!

[Christopher]

The more important question here is:
Where were Haley and his Show on Fri, the 24th October 1958?
In Mannheim or in Karlsruhe?
Or in both cities?, since from one to the other, it's only a car drive of hardly an hour.
I didn't find an answer in this informative thread (or have I overseen it?).

1958

Oct 23 (Thu) - Wiesbaden (wearing his army uniform)
Oct 24 (Fri) - Mannheim
Oct 29 (Wed) - Stuttgart

[Mississippi]

The more important question here is:
Where were Haley and his Show on Fri, the 24th October 1958?
In Mannheim or in Karlsruhe?
Or in both cities?, since from one to the other, it's only a car drive of hardly an hour.
I didn't find an answer in this informative thread (or have I overseen it?).

1958

Oct 23 (Thu) - Wiesbaden (wearing his army uniform)
Oct 24 (Fri) - Mannheim
Oct 29 (Wed) - Stuttgart

Perhaps the most celebrated meeting between Haley and Presley was during The Comets’ European tour in 1958. To the chagrin of his fans and management, and at the height of his career to that point, Elvis Presley had joined the Army and was stationed at a base near Friedberg when Bill and the Comets arrived in Frankfurt, Germany on October 23rd for a series of concerts in major German cities. Elvis showed up in uniform and was admitted backstage to Haley’s dressing room. It was a fleeting visit (Bill had to get to another show that night in Wiesbaden.) There is a famous photograph of the dressing room where Elvis sits as Haley tunes his guitar in preparation for his performance. Comets drummer Ralph Jones recalled Elvis telling members of the band, “You know, if it weren’t for you boys, I’d still be driving a truck back in Memphis.” Jerry Lee Lewis’ similarly said to Haley, “Without you, we’d all be driving trucks,” probably referencing Elvis.
After what must have been a very brief meeting, Elvis made a second visit to the show in Mannheim on October 24th, where he was photographed (out of his Army uniform and wearing a suit and tie) by well-known photographer Günther Thomas with members of the band, as well as seated at the piano with the Comets’ bass player, Al Pompilli on bass behind him. There is also a photo of Elvis with supporting act Kurt Edelhagen and Elvis’ father, Vernon Presley, in the shot. Elvis’s third and final visit took place on October 29th at the Killesburg Halle in Stuttgart.

https://drdldj.medium.com/the-father-and-the-king-e3fa0bc00eb5

Mississippi

[Christopher]

Thank you, Mississippi, but that doesn't answer my question.

[Frank R.]

German tour 1958

October 23 1958 Wiesbaden Germany
October 23 1958 Frankfurt Germany
October 24 1958 Karlsruhe Germany
October 24 1958 Mannheim Germany
October 25 1958 Wuppertal Germany
October 25 1958 Düsseldorf Germany
October 26 1958 Berlin Germany
October 27 1958 Hamburg Germany
October 28 1958 Essen Germany
October 29 1958 Stuttgart Germany

[Rocker]

This is Bill Ramsey in 1958.

It sure is. Good ol' Bill made some really strong records in the 50s and 60s. I still love to listen to them. His singing made up for even the goofiest production like "Wumba-tumba-Schokoladeneisverkäufer". One of my favorites is the english version of "Go man, go":

[Christopher]

Thank you so much, Frank.
6 different cities in the first 3 days alone sounds like a strong schedule!
Does your source list the venues, too?

German tour 1958

October 23 1958 Wiesbaden Germany
October 23 1958 Frankfurt Germany
October 24 1958 Karlsruhe Germany
October 24 1958 Mannheim Germany
October 25 1958 Wuppertal Germany
October 25 1958 Düsseldorf Germany
October 26 1958 Berlin Germany
October 27 1958 Hamburg Germany
October 28 1958 Essen Germany
October 29 1958 Stuttgart Germany

[drjohncarpenter]

Hi Doc,

this is definitely not Bill Ramsey !!!

Mississippi

Guess the article is incorrect.

He's definitely NOT Little Gerhard, either.

Must just be a lucky fan.

[Frank R.]

Thank you so much, Frank.
6 different cities in the first 3 days alone sounds like a strong schedule!
Does your source list the venues, too?

German tour 1958

October 23 1958 Wiesbaden Germany
October 23 1958 Frankfurt Germany
October 24 1958 Karlsruhe Germany
October 24 1958 Mannheim Germany
October 25 1958 Wuppertal Germany
October 25 1958 Düsseldorf Germany
October 26 1958 Berlin Germany
October 27 1958 Hamburg Germany
October 28 1958 Essen Germany
October 29 1958 Stuttgart Germany

My pleasure Christopher, I added the venues to the list:

October 23 1958 Wiesbaden Germany Rhein-Main Halle
October 23 1958 Frankfurt Germany Film Palast
October 24 1958 Karlsruhe Germany Schwarzwald Halle
October 24 1958 Mannheim Germany Universum
October 25 1958 Wuppertal Germany Thalia Theater
October 25 1958 Düsseldorf Germany Apollo Theater
October 26 1958 Berlin Germany Sportpalast
October 27 1958 Hamburg Germany Ernst Merck Halle
October 28 1958 Essen Germany Gruggahalle
October 29 1958 Stuttgart Germany Killesberghalle

[Mississippi]

Hi Doc,

this is definitely not Bill Ramsey !!!

Mississippi

Guess the article is incorrect.

He's definitely NOT Little Gerhard, either.

Must just be a lucky fan.

Just found on Pinterest

https://de.pinterest.com/pin/in-october-23-1958-elvis-attended-a-bill-haley-performance-in-frankfurt-and-visited-haley-backstagewhere-he-also-met-little-ger--533535887089831551/

Mississippi

[Sarita]

Hi Doc,

this is definitely not Bill Ramsey !!!

Mississippi

Guess the article is incorrect.

He's definitely NOT Little Gerhard, either.

Must just be a lucky fan.

Just found on Pinterest

https://de.pinterest.com/pin/in-october-23-1958-elvis-attended-a-bill-haley-performance-in-frankfurt-and-visited-haley-backstagewhere-he-also-met-little-ger--533535887089831551/

Mississippi

Thank you!

[drjohncarpenter]

Just found on Pinterest

https://de.pinterest.com/pin/in-october-23-1958-elvis-attended-a-bill-haley-performance-in-frankfurt-and-visited-haley-backstagewhere-he-also-met-little-ger--533535887089831551/

Mississippi

Yeah, whoever wrote that is wrong.

Notice no sourcing. No uploader name attached. Notice the date in the URL is also wrong.

As my photo comparison proved:

• The man is taller than Gerhard.

• He does not look like him.

It's like FB. People just type anything.

[Frank R.]

Translated from a Dutch newspaper:


Rock 'n roll volcano erupts: Bill Haley draws trail of wreckage in Germany, Elvis Presley obediently with Dad and Grandma

BONN, 4 nov 1958

Bill Haley lays a bloody trail through West Germany The drama started in Berlin early last week and it repeated itself with the regularity of fireworks in Hamburg, Essen and other cities. But Berlin took the cake. The place of action was the Sportpaleis, a modest name for such a dazzling building. This is simply the former and eternal capital of German kings, emperors and republican empires.

Kurt Edelhagen's orchestra was the first to settle on stage and played, as quiet Germans tend to play. Then came Bill Haley with his Cornets, and then but that was a little later and not according to the program—a seething eruption of volcanic rock in half-leather jackets, jeans, and other attributes that are of no avail. So captivated were they by the tones of Haley's natural and artificial vocal cords that they threw off all the shackles laboriously applied by fathers and other educators. The palace turned into an arena, where the toreador was hunted by the bull, by hundreds of bulls. Bill Haley and his compatriots, who just before had elicited tortured cries from their guitars and basses on their backs on stage, crooning with musical pleasure, strategically withdrew in order to save their precious instruments, just as the Rock and Roll monarchs motivated under the shouting of "shame". The situation became infernal and even the guardian angels of the Berlin police completely lost their grip on the devils, who all jumped out of their boxes at the same time. Everything and everyone, who was even remotely eligible for this, was grabbed.

Fanatically swinging "Halb-starken" grabbed each other, microphones, tape devices and other objects. Everyone became furious with everyone, grabbed bottles, pounded with them on the glass cabin of the radio broadcaster. A precious grand piano gave itself with an intense moan, as well as many many expensive parquet places. When the young people had taken 15,000 marks to the other world and five policemen to the hospital, they thought it was enough.

THUNDERSTORM MOVED ON
A day later, BUI and his crew moved to Hamburg where the boiling point was reached a little later. Here, the fans enjoyed Haley's improvisations so much that they stood on chairs with children's trumpets making so much noise that they could no longer hear Bill and his band at all. Of course, this provoked resistance from the connoisseurs, who followed the good example of their Berlin counterparts and reached for the armour. Consequences: 20,000 marks of damage and tear gas bombs from the Hamburg police, which even made the mothers at home cry. In Essen, the police had become wise the next day through experience. She kept several hundred of her men in immediate readiness and gave them powerful jets of water at their disposal. which worked preventively to the extent that the situation could be limited to some drunken tumult.

ELVIS CALM
In our minds we are just seeing. heard and read all this on a visit to Elvis Presley who, as the attentive reader knows, is serving his service in American barracks at Friedberg. At five o'clock, . when the exercise and shooting are done, he is picked up at the gate by his loving father and his father’s glowing mother. Then the trio drives to Nauheim where the family has rented a hotel apartment with a kitchen. There the young singer eats his grandmother's American meals and sleeps the sleep of the righteous conscript, only to be driven back by taxi to his less privileged brothers in arms at seven o'clock in the morningI No, our Presley does not discredit his German peers. He limits himself to making the hearts of the teenagers, who come from far and wide on their scooters, beat a few rhythmic beats faster. The trail he leaves behind is invisible. It is one of longing, which hurts a little, but it is a blissful pain

[drjohncarpenter]

From the same day, posted yesterday on FB in the Elvis Pictures group:

Just re-reading the article you posted with this wonderful, mysterious and previously-unseen image.

Photography at the right time in the right place

That evening, press photographer Günther Thomas (1921-2015), whose photo archive is now housed in the MARCHIVUM Mannheim, was among the last guests. He seized the opportunity to take snapshots of Elvis shaking hands with Bill Haley and Elvis posing at the piano, beautifully lit by sidelights.

Robert Häusser was also among the guests. Using his Rolleiflex, a twin-lens reflex camera popular for photojournalism due to its portability, he also photographed Elvis sitting at the piano—but from a frontal perspective and without lighting, using only the available, pale light falling from above.

In contrast to Günther Thomas's perfectly lit Elvis, Häusser's photograph appears dark and mysterious. A completely different Elvis is revealed here. Not the showman with a broad smile, but a self-absorbed, even pensive Elvis, his facial features frozen into a mask, if not a death mask. Time seems frozen, the young face appears timeless, and the contours of the head vaguely suggest a skull. It's as if Häusser's basic existential state has settled over Elvis's face in a melancholic veil. Since the eyes are barely visible, only a white flicker in the left eye, the image appears somewhat somber.

For a long time, the negative of this portrait was considered lost. Even Häusser noted in his book containing the many numbered contact prints under the heading "Personalities," "Negative missing!" Fishing out a negative from a pool of over 60,000 negatives is like looking for a needle in a haystack. With a lot of luck and perseverance, Häusser's daughter Ina was able to track down the missing negative and thus rescue this unique historical document from oblivion.

The striking portrait is currently on display in the special exhibition "SACHLICH NEU." Here, selected works by Robert Häusser enter into a fascinating dialogue with iconic photographs from the 1920s and 1930s by August Sander and Albert Renger-Patzsch.

https://www.rem-mannheim.de/blog/elvis-in-mannheim/

So two talented photographers were backstage on October 24, 1958 in Mannheim, one a newsman (Günther Thomas), the other an arty type (Robert Häusser).

And the arty guy only snapped a single photo, lost it, and years later it's found again.

What a story, thanks for finding and sharing here!

[Sarita]

Translated from a Dutch newspaper:


Rock 'n roll volcano erupts: Bill Haley draws trail of wreckage in Germany, Elvis Presley obediently with Dad and Grandma

BONN, 4 nov 1958

Bill Haley lays a bloody trail through West Germany The drama started in Berlin early last week and it repeated itself with the regularity of fireworks in Hamburg, Essen and other cities. But Berlin took the cake. The place of action was the Sportpaleis, a modest name for such a dazzling building. This is simply the former and eternal capital of German kings, emperors and republican empires.

Kurt Edelhagen's orchestra was the first to settle on stage and played, as quiet Germans tend to play. Then came Bill Haley with his Cornets, and then but that was a little later and not according to the program—a seething eruption of volcanic rock in half-leather jackets, jeans, and other attributes that are of no avail. So captivated were they by the tones of Haley's natural and artificial vocal cords that they threw off all the shackles laboriously applied by fathers and other educators. The palace turned into an arena, where the toreador was hunted by the bull, by hundreds of bulls. Bill Haley and his compatriots, who just before had elicited tortured cries from their guitars and basses on their backs on stage, crooning with musical pleasure, strategically withdrew in order to save their precious instruments, just as the Rock and Roll monarchs motivated under the shouting of "shame". The situation became infernal and even the guardian angels of the Berlin police completely lost their grip on the devils, who all jumped out of their boxes at the same time. Everything and everyone, who was even remotely eligible for this, was grabbed.

Fanatically swinging "Halb-starken" grabbed each other, microphones, tape devices and other objects. Everyone became furious with everyone, grabbed bottles, pounded with them on the glass cabin of the radio broadcaster. A precious grand piano gave itself with an intense moan, as well as many many expensive parquet places. When the young people had taken 15,000 marks to the other world and five policemen to the hospital, they thought it was enough.

THUNDERSTORM MOVED ON
A day later, BUI and his crew moved to Hamburg where the boiling point was reached a little later. Here, the fans enjoyed Haley's improvisations so much that they stood on chairs with children's trumpets making so much noise that they could no longer hear Bill and his band at all. Of course, this provoked resistance from the connoisseurs, who followed the good example of their Berlin counterparts and reached for the armour. Consequences: 20,000 marks of damage and tear gas bombs from the Hamburg police, which even made the mothers at home cry. In Essen, the police had become wise the next day through experience. She kept several hundred of her men in immediate readiness and gave them powerful jets of water at their disposal. which worked preventively to the extent that the situation could be limited to some drunken tumult.

ELVIS CALM
In our minds we are just seeing. heard and read all this on a visit to Elvis Presley who, as the attentive reader knows, is serving his service in American barracks at Friedberg. At five o'clock, . when the exercise and shooting are done, he is picked up at the gate by his loving father and his father’s glowing mother. Then the trio drives to Nauheim where the family has rented a hotel apartment with a kitchen. There the young singer eats his grandmother's American meals and sleeps the sleep of the righteous conscript, only to be driven back by taxi to his less privileged brothers in arms at seven o'clock in the morningI No, our Presley does not discredit his German peers. He limits himself to making the hearts of the teenagers, who come from far and wide on their scooters, beat a few rhythmic beats faster. The trail he leaves behind is invisible. It is one of longing, which hurts a little, but it is a blissful pain

Thank you! There's a lot of truth in that. Elvis was only allowed to go abroad while serving in the army. Did he know back then in Bad Nauheim that he would never return as a singer?

[jurasic1968]

No.

[Sarita]

I think he even said after he returned to the US that he wanted to return as a singer.

[jurasic1968]

Yes, indeed.

[hello73]

Germany, Germany, Germany. Oh, until recently we were friends, and I've been to the USA three times and loved the country. Now you've elected the devil and his followers. Now we're going to be enemies. And considering the statements coming from the black house of hell, this is a serious statement!

[drjohncarpenter]

Germany, Germany, Germany. Oh, until recently we were friends, and I've been to the USA three times and loved the country. Now you've elected the devil and his followers. Now we're going to be enemies. And considering the statements coming from the black house of hell, this is a serious statement!

You're veering wildly off-topic here.

That said, 155 million votes were cast in the last election, and the majority did not vote for the GOP MAGA, convicted felon candidate.

But of the two major parties, the Democratic candidate got 1.48% less of the popular vote. There was no "mandate."

The winner got a plurality, not a majority.

You can bet that the people who rejected the lawless, immoral, deceitful GOP MAGA last November will not allow any desecration of our international relationships to stand, nor will they accept any attempt to destroy our precious democracy.

[hello73]

I was aware that I was deviating from the topic. However, this was somehow an opportunity to express my sadness. I am so sad when you talk or read about old times and everything is completely destroyed within three months. I would never have thought that vicious and spiteful people would come to power. Of course every president is elected to do the best for his country and of course, injustices have to be talked about. But your government is declaring war on us economically and also because of Greenland. I can see from your age that you belong to the generation that liberated us from the Nazis and brought our countries together in friendship. That is being destroyed right now. The thought that Elvis and his music should actually hold us together in this forum and that an Elvis imitator is singing for the devil is depressing. After all, there are connections between Elvis and Germany/Europe, albeit brief. And as described here, other rock'n rollers too. Music in particular should connect but also warn or say something. But here, too, everything is starting to wobble. I like your country music. However, it's divided between cosmopolitan artists and rednecks. Before I buy an album here, I look online to see what views the artist represents, or whether that artist has the balls to contradict the devil once in a while. But most of the 50% have neither the balls nor the intellectual education! Are we hoping that music of all genres will soon be able to be enjoyed without these feelings again? Well, that's about it. We won't be changing that anytime soon. But sometimes it just has to come out. Excuse my poor English (with the help of Google Translate).

[Sarita]

I find it unacceptable that Trump constantly brings up Elvis. He's as big as Elvis, and then there's the thing about the impersonator. Elvis and Trump have nothing in common.

[Mississippi]

Here's a story (originally written in German), that I haven't heard before. Is it really true?
Translated with DeepL.com (free version)

When the curtain fell on the Mannheim cinema in N7 and most of the young audience had gone home, Elvis took to the stage like an Orpheus and began to improvise. It must have been a magical moment and at the same time a great moment in rock 'n' roll for those who were still there when Elvis celebrated a few songs from his repertoire on the guitar and piano, accompanied by Haley's Comets.
This jam session, an informal interplay of musicians who did not usually play or sing together in a band, is unique in that Elvis disregarded the ban on performing imposed by his management. During his service in the US Army, he was forbidden to perform in public. Another special feature of this spontaneous music event was that he never performed in Europe. Instead, Elvis' appearances were limited to Canada and the USA.
Photography in the right place at the right time


And here is the full article in German
https://www.rem-mannheim.de/blog/elvis-in-mannheim/



Mississippi

[Sarita]

Elvis allegedly also performed secretly in Grafenwöhr. However, no photos or recordings exist of this, which I find very unfortunate.

[jurasic1968]

Bill Haley performed in Western Germany and in Western Berlin, because the city and the Germany country was divided in two. Elvis was stationed 18 month in the US Army in Wiesbaden, Western Germany, from September 1958 to March 1960.

[drjohncarpenter]

Elvis allegedly also performed secretly in Grafenwöhr. However, no photos or recordings exist of this, which I find very unfortunate.

It was an impromptu jam on the house piano in a small place called the Mickey Bar. No chance of random recordings or photographs. Bet it sounds a lot like the German home demos that we have. It dates to sometime in December 1958.

Wrote about it back in 2017.








Grafenwöhr
https://www.elvis-collectors.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=1608185#p1608185