INSULT TO INJURY: BLACK VELVET AND LITTLE BOY SMILE: PART ONE -- AMERICA LOVES ELVIS

What you first notice when you walk into the little Wright City cafe, 50 miles or so west of downtown St. Louis, is not the dining room off to the left, with its few wobbly tables draped in checkered vinyl cloths. Nor is it the smell of slightly scorched baked beans or deep-fried onion rings billowing from the kitchen and hanging over the place like morning fog over the Mississippi.

What you notice is Elvis.

There in the 50s Cafe and Arcade, nearly 22 years after the King died in his Memphis mansion, his image is kept alive, plastered on bumper stickers, posters, ashtrays and an odd assortment of knickknacks.

And probably more black velvet portraits than you ever care to see.

The restaurant touts itself as "the most photographed cafe in America" with "good home cooked food at reasonable prices." I suppose it's true. Its menu offers the half-pound Big John Burger, the quarter-pound Marilyn Cheeseburger and, of course, the Elvis Burger.

But I wasn't there for the food. No, I came to see what lay beyond the gift shop, the dining room and the few video games -- a small room that its curators call the "Elvis is Alive Museum."

The museum claims to offer definitive proof that Presley did not die from a drug-induced heart attack while sitting on a toilet at Graceland but is still very much alive and with us always.

Elvis, it claims, was actually an informant for the FBI who was doing undercover work among drug traffickers. When the threats against his life got too frequent to ignore, Elvis, with the help of the Bureau, faked his own death and entered the witness relocation program.

And relocate he did. He has been seen singing at a wedding reception in Flagstaff, Ariz., filling his car at a gas station in Chattanooga, walking the streets of a sleepy town in Mississippi, having a cup of coffee at a diner in Bucksnort, Kan., and ordering a Whopper at a Burger King in Kalamazoo, Mich. One account even says Elvis defected to Vologda, Russia, where he still lives today.

And, frankly, I believe them all. In his own way, Elvis is alive.

Not that I believe any of us will see Elvis walking around and taking care of business any time soon, mind you. I'm quite certain he's eaten his last peanut butter and banana sandwich, given away his last Cadillac and ripped out his last white jumpsuit.

Existentially speaking, Elvis has left the building.

Still, there is no denying that he yet lives in the hearts of millions of fans throughout the world. In some ways his death at age 42 only increased his popularity and fame. As Howard DeWitt, a California history professor and follower of the Elvis phenomenon, put it, dying was the "best career move Elvis ever made."

Since his death, in fact, more than 1,400 stories in major U.S. newspapers and more 300 books in nine languages have been written about him.

The U.S. Postal Service recently reported that the postage stamp featuring the gyrating rocker was its most popular stamp ever. Ever.

There are more Elvis impersonators working today then when Elvis was alive, including African-American Elvises, little kid Elvises, sky-diving Elvises and, my personal favorite, Tortelvis.

Tortelvis, the lead singer of Dread Zeppelin, is an Elvis impersonator who wears Rastafarian dreadlocks with his pompadour and sings Led Zeppelin songs to a reggae beat and in a vocal manner befitting the King.

Then there are the religious variations on the Elvis theme: A 24-hour Church of Elvis in Portland, Ore.; the First Presleyterian Church of Elvis the Divine; (I'm not making this up.); and the followers of Elvishnu, a group that claims Elvis in the 10th incarnation of the Hindu god Vishnu.

Tongue-in-cheek? Definitely. Firmly. Yet, not so far off the mark.

Last Friday was Elvis' birthday. He would have been 64 years old had he lived. Yet, very few remembered the day, very few celebrated it.

But every August, thousands of devoted followers make the pilgrimage to Memphis to be at the gates of Graceland on the 16th, the anniversary of Elvis' death. In commemorating that day rather than his birthday, we afford Elvis an honor usually reserved for the saints of Christendom. It is, perhaps, fitting for a man who has moved beyond the status of pop star to become an icon.

Trying to understand the whole Elvis phenomenon is not an easy task.

Forget the music. Certainly there were more talented musicians and better singers than Elvis. Many of his earliest and best songs were covers of old R&B or rockabilly tunes done better by the original artists.

Elvis' breakout hit, "That's All Right, Mama," was actually a remake of a song written and recorded by Arthur "Big Boy" Crudup, a song which Elvis heard Crudup sing on Beale Street. The same with "Hound Dog." Big Mama Thornton, the first to record "Hound Dog," did a masterful job with her version of the song Elvis then made famous.

And forget the movies. Certainly there were better actors in better films. In fact, most of the time Elvis seemed to be walking through his films with a wink to the camera and a nudge to the audience as if he recognized how bad his movies really were.

And though he was handsome in his way, there were better looking men in show business, too. As he got older, he didn't become more distinguished looking as some men do. He just got fat.

So why does Elvis -- who, in his final years, became little more than a caricature of himself -- remain popular today? And why has his fame grown larger than his sideburns and continues to expand faster than his waistline ever did?

Stay tuned.

~Jeffrey Jackson is a staff writer for the Southeast Missourian.