Stuck on Elvis : Fans Willing to Wait Hours to Be Among the First to Buy the Stamp

Kendra Williams is one of those people who loves the young and the old Elvis.

She has remained a stoically loyal fan through the TV movies and news shows that have portrayed her idol’s final years as troubled and unhappy.

The 43-year-old Anaheim woman even stayed stone-faced through the “wacky” tabloid headlines about Elvis sightings and alien incarnations.

On Friday, she was having the last laugh.

“People used to make fun of him. Now all of a sudden everyone loves him and wants to buy his stamps,” Williams said. “He’s so special--really an American hero. People didn’t see that until now.”

Williams and about 300 others braved cloudbursts and hours-long lines outside the Richard Nixon Library & Birthplace in Yorba Linda Friday to be among the first to buy the 29-cent stamp bearing the pop icon’s image.

The stamp captured national attention last year when the U.S. Postal Service held an election to decide whether the singer should be depicted in his youth or later in life. The young Elvis won--easily--and as the first stamps went on sale Friday, fans lined up around the country to buy them.

So it was in Orange County. In Santa Ana, about two dozen people waited for nearly an hour at a post office. And at the Hard Rock Cafe in Newport Beach, some celebrated what would have been Presley’s 58th birthday by trying to impersonate the King.

“This is very curious. It’s kind of comical,” said Huntington Beach resident Westley Hoo as he surveyed the 20 or so people waiting at a Santa Ana post office for the strike of noon, when the stamps would go on sale. “Everyone is doing it because it’s the thing to do. That’s why I’m here . . . to say I have some,” Hoo said.

Post office patrons walked away with sheets of the new issue. But at the Nixon library, fans got something else: For $3, they could buy postcards showing a smiling Richard Nixon shaking hands with Presley in the Oval Office. Each bore an Elvis stamp marked with a special “Richard Nixon Library & Birthplace” cancellation.

At noon, more than 100 people had formed a line around the library lobby waiting to purchase the cards from the gift shop. By the end of the day, library officials said, about 5,000 people had shown up--so many that officials had to limit the number of cards an individual could buy.

Die-hard Presley and Nixon fans could even get their pictures taken next to life-size cutouts of the two.

The library will continue the festivities today in recognition of Nixon’s 80th birthday. The celebration will include free admission through Sunday, and free birthday cake will be given to the first 200 visitors at the library today. At 11 a.m., visitors can join in singing “Happy Birthday” to the former President through a telephone hookup with his home in New York.

On Friday--Elvis Day--visitors to the library Friday saw the chrome World War II pistol Presley presented to Nixon at their meeting in December, 1970. They also listened to an interactive tape in which the former President discusses his get-together with the singer.

Several visitors commented on the tape, in which Nixon describes Presley as a “decent” and “sincere” man whose “flamboyancy was covering up his shyness.”

Nixon “seemed to think highly of Elvis,” said Barbara Victor, a visitor from Pasadena. “It’s rare to get such a personal view of a famous person.”

Hank Forest, who came to the library from Los Angeles with his wife and visiting sister-in-law, said: “I’ve admired both men for some time. I’m glad to see them honored in this way. They each had their own troubles. I think that makes us understand them better.”

The Hard Rock Cafe in Newport Beach had a decidedly less serious celebration, offering a free lunch to anyone willing to impersonate the King.

Two men took the restaurant up on its offer, sculpting their hair, coloring in sideburns and grabbing guitars to briefly serenade the lunchtime crowd with the Elvis classic “Hound Dog.”

Although admitting that he was heavier and older than the 1950s-era King, impersonator Kevin Clair, 44, of Capistrano Beach, jokingly insisted: “I’m the young Elvis!”

Young or old, for his biggest fans, it doesn’t matter.

“He was the King. I’d do anything for the King,” said Mary Wells, 44, of Newport Beach. She purchased 2,000 stamps to resell at her mail and fax shop. “It’s an honor to stand in line for an hour for him.”

Times correspondent Mimi Ko contributed to this story