Elvis Presley's personal barber sold a lock of The King's hair for record amount
Elvis Presley was as famous for his jet-black slicked-back pompadour hairstyle as he was for his rock ‘n’ roll music.
The King’s sideburns alone were enough to make admiring women in the front rows of his concerts lose consciousness.
So, it’s no wonder that some hair clippings collected by his personal barber, Homer ‘Gill’ Gilleland, became the most expensive hair sold at auction online.
Interestingly, Elvis was actually a natural blond and dyed his hair black.
But the mass of dark clippings from his head sold to an anonymous buyer during an online auction held by MastroNet Inc, in Oak Brook, Illinois, USA, on 15 November 2002.
The Elvis fan paid a massive $115,120 (£72,791, including buyer's premium) for the hair.
It measured around 3 in (8 cm) in diameter and was accompanied by letters of authenticity from the star's friend Tom Morgan Jr., Elvis memorabilia expert John W. Heath, and John Reznikoff of University Archives, a respected authority in the field of hair collecting.
Before Elvis’s famous locks were sold, the record belonged to a lock of hair from Vice Admiral Lord Nelson (1758–1805) that sold at auction in Crewkerne, Somerset in 1988.
It was bought by a bookseller, who paid £5,575 ($9,799) for it.
Elvis’s hair wasn’t the only thing to make him a record breaker.
Image: Shutterstock
In 1961, Elvis was the first person to top the UK singles and albums charts simultaneously (male) when his single “Are You Lonesome Tonight?” rose to No.1 at the same time as his soundtrack album G.I. Blues was at the top of the albums chart.
Decades after his death in 1977, Elvis became the first musical artist inducted into three different Halls of Fame.
It was in 2001 that he was inducted into the Gospel Music Association’s Gospel Music Hall of Fame. He was already an inductee of the Country Music Association’s Country Music Hall of Fame and the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.
To this day, Elvis holds the record for most No.1 singles (UK) with a total of 21, including “All Shook Up” and “It’s Now or Never”.
Read about more famous faces who’ve broken records in our Arts and Entertainment section.
He also has the most RIAA certificates ever (299), the most platinum RIAA certificates (82) and the most multi-platinum RIAA certificates (32).
RIAA means the Recording Industry Association of America, who give out prestigious sales awards for Gold, Platinum and Diamond records.
With more than 1 billion sales, Elvis is the best-selling solo artist not only in the US, but the entire world, and in 1957, he embarked on the first stadium tour by a musician.
Elvis has broken many other records with his music, which seems guaranteed to live on forever.