Elvis Presley Signed Album & Macrame Belt, ca. 1970

Appraised on: August 18, 2007

Appraised in: Las Vegas, Nevada

Appraised by: Philip Weiss

Category: Collectibles

Episode Info: Las Vegas, Hour 2 (#1217)

Originally Aired: May 19, 2008

IMAGE: 1 of 1  

Appraisal Video: (2:44)

GUEST: I skated with an ice show, and we played Nashville, Tennessee, right after Elvis came out of the service. And we invited him to the show. In return he invited us to his house for a party. So when he came to Las Vegas at the International Hotel, two of my girlfriends and I went to see his show. And we met one of his bodyguards, Sonny West. And he took us down to say hello to Elvis 'cause we had met him at the party. I came back about three nights later to see the show again and ran into Sonny. And he took me back down to the dressing room again. And I was kidding around with Elvis and asking him about his macramé belt, if he made them himself. And, of course, he said no. He was teasing me. He said he had stayed up all night long making them. Well, when he went in to get dressed to go up to the stage, he came back out and he had the macramé belt in his hand. And just kind of pitched it to me. And gave it to me, so I've had it ever since then. This was in... the '70s.

APPRAISER: And the record album?

GUEST: And the record album he gave me about three nights later when I went down. He gave me a record album and signed it for me.

APPRAISER: Great story.

GUEST: Oh, thank you.

APPRAISER: It's pretty good to be able to meet a celebrity like that.

GUEST: He was wonderful. He was such a wonderful man to talk to. And very handsome, a very handsome man.

APPRAISER: Well, the record album's interesting because Elvis did sign quite a bit of things. I see very often scraps of paper, letters, not very often on record albums. Not unheard of and not super rare by any means, but it's really nice. And I'm going to give you estimates based on what I think they would sell for at auction. On the album, you can see it's actually inscribed to you. It's to Freddie and it's signed by Elvis Presley. And I think a fair auction estimate for that would be $1,200 to $1,800.

GUEST: Okay.

APPRAISER: That's for the record album.

GUEST: Yeah.

APPRAISER: Now, let's take a little step up a bit, and we'll talk about the belt. When you're talking about something that's personal memorabilia that was actually worn by a world-famous celebrity, a piece like this at auction, I'd put a fairly conservative estimate at $6,000 to $8,000.

GUEST: Oh, okay.

APPRAISER: So as a package, both pieces together-- again, fairly conservative auction estimate-- maybe $7,500 to $9,500 on the pair. It's just great stuff and if you're going to put an insurance value on it, you'd probably want to insure it for a little bit higher, maybe $10,000 for the two pieces.

GUEST: Okay.

APPRAISER: I'm glad you brought it down and you made Vegas what it's supposed to be, a place where Elvis is remembered.