For Kalispell's Priscilla, Elvis is always within reach

Jul. 3—Priscilla French is not, by any means, "obsessed" with Elvis Presley. She doesn't have nearly enough memorabilia in her collection of Elvis records, Elvis books, Elvis photographs, and, most importantly, Elvis' scarves, to be deemed obsessive.

Surely it's nothing compared to the fanaticism exhibited by other disciples she has met throughout the years.

"Some of these people had shrines. Whole rooms devoted to Elvis. I've seen them send me pictures of velvet paintings," she says, laughing and throwing up her hands. "I thought that was a bit extreme. But who says I'm not extreme?"

French, a retired teacher and motivational speaker, has collected Elvis related merchandise since she first heard him as a teenager.

"I mean, when you're a 13-year-old girl in 1955, what else can you do but fall in love with Elvis Presley ... I was caught up in a phenomenon," she says.

French spent the following 17 years dreaming of seeing him perform live before watching a concert film in theaters called "Elvis: That's the Way It Is." The movie captures Elvis in Las Vegas returning to the stage after years away for his acting career. One scene that caught French's attention documented how Elvis devoted a portion of his performance to wandering along the edge of the stage, giving scarves and a kiss on the lips to his female fans. To French, this was the final straw,

"I went straight home and started planning to see him live. I wrote to the chamber of commerce in Las Vegas to find out when and where he was going to perform next and the next concert wasn't going to be until February so my husband and I just said, 'Let's go,'" French recalls.

At 80 years old, French is still bursting with energy. When she speaks about the things that excite her (mostly her husband, traveling, her family, Elvis and teaching, not necessarily in that order), her eye contact is unbreakable. She gestures wildly when telling stories that are almost 50 years old, clapping when she gets to the good parts. The only time her hands are still is when she pulls out four neatly folded, lightly stained silk scarves from a manilla envelope.

Each scarf, French says, was given to her personally by Elvis during different performances in the final stretch of his career. She obtained the first two during his Las Vegas residency and the third one from a show in Spokane, Washington.

French accompanies the presentation of each scarf with a story, each one wilder than the last, but all of them with the same ending: a scarf and a kiss on the lips.

She got the first at the International Hilton Hotel, where Elvis would perform during his Las Vegas residency in 1973. At the show's start, the whole room was dark, but eventually she got a glimpse of his stark, white boots underneath the stage curtain. He emerged to the theme from "2001: A Space Odyssey."

"It's hard to describe how sensational it was," French says. "I went breathless. My legs were rubber. I was just shocked."

According to French, Elvis got through almost the whole show before he finally began a slow song and started fingering his collar, a gesture that French learned from the film that meant he was going to start handing out scarves. French took her cue and stood up but couldn't walk forward.

"My legs just wouldn't work," French remembers. "I was petrified."

Finally, her husband pushed her in the back. She suddenly found herself at the front of the stage. Sure enough, Elvis saw her, stooped down to her level, kissed her on the lips and gave her a scarf.

"By the time I made it back to my seat I was shaking like a leaf," she says.

French saw Elvis on three other occasions within the next two years. In one story she went to see him in the Spokane Coliseum, an event that French says may have ended with him giving her a cold for her trouble,

"That one time he gave me a scarf and started walking away and I just said to Elvis, 'Where's my kiss?' And he said, 'Well I can't kiss you baby, I've got a cold,' and I just looked at him and said, 'Give me the cold.' And he laughed and kissed me anyway," she recalls.

French says she even started a riot during a show in Spokane, Washington,

"This time there was an announcement made by the officials before the show that no one would be allowed to leave their seat as a security measure," she says, pausing for a moment and smiling. "Do I listen to that warning? I did not."

French says that she rushed the stage and, before security could haul her away, Elvis stooped down to give her another scarf and a kiss.

"It was the only scarf that was given out during that whole performance but as soon as they saw me get one, everyone else wanted one, too, and everyone rushed the stage," French recalls. "Elvis only had so many scarves so he just started throwing them out and all the girls were tearing them apart and fighting for scraps."

Despite her passion, she maintains that the collection of memorabilia is nothing more than a hobby and a way to memorialize an important part of her life,

"I've had a life outside of all of this, I've had to move on as everyone has," she says.

She cites other collections of souvenirs from more than 80 different countries that she has accumulated over years of traveling.

"It's really just the teacher in me," French says, "to want to learn more about cultures and histories, but also wanting to preserve them and give myself little reminders of those experiences."

When asked about the new Elvis biopic starring Austin Butler that was released last week — the aptly named "Elvis" — French had nothing but praise for the film,

"I thought it was lovely," she says. "Austin Butler was cute and it really captured how outrageous and controversial he was."

When the topic shifts to the question of giving any of the collection away or selling it, French has a quick and easy answer prepared: "No. Absolutely not."

"When I go, my kids will have all this," she says.

French saves one scarf to show last, a folded, light blue piece of fabric slightly more stained than the rest of her collection. This one, she says, was obtained during the second performance she attended on her first night in Vegas.

According to her, it was actually a replacement scarf that Elvis gave to her after the first one was stolen by another woman in the crowd. Following the theft, Elvis casually went back to his piano, picked up another scarf, wiped his face and chest with it, and gave it to French.

Back in the present day, French scrutinizes the cloth for a few moments.

"You know there's still a lot of sweat and DNA in this," French says, finally. "Maybe we can clone him."