A highlight of the 2025 Parkes Elvis Festival will be the launch of the Gates of Graceland, a full-sized replica of the iconic Graceland gates.
And in a very special event for our community, festival founders Bob and Ann Steel will be inducted to the Wall of Fame.
The couple were caught speechless at the Festival launch where the announcement was made, but it's only a fitting recognition of their contribution.
This festival that draws upwards of 20,000 people to our town each January was their vision, birthed 32 years ago when they owned the Gracelands Restaurant.
It's doing just what they had hoped when they had that first conversation with Roel ten Cate in 1992, Ann said, which was bring people to town at a time the locals usually headed away from the heat.
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"To honour Elvis but to do such a lot of good for not just Parkes for all the surrounding towns," she said.
To see thousands gather in Cooke Park now, more filling every local venue, is all they could ever have hoped for it.
There's just nothing like the atmosphere of this particular festival.
"People come to have a good time," Ann says in summary - and they do, they come dressed up and ready to make new friends.
Parkes' Festival is also unique in that the whole community has embraced it so the festival can offer everything from cars of the era to art to the pet show, ukeleles to dancing - all on top of world-class music.
The inspiration for the costumes, the parade, the events, is seemingly endless.
Bob and Ann have watched it grow, watched children embrace it and grow up loving it, enjoyed how people from all over the country and the world connect.
"You do make friends because you see them again next year," Ann said.
"You can tell it's a happy festival," Bob added.
The Gates of Graceland will be a beautiful new attraction honouring key contributors to the festival, and they are a real feature at the Parkes Visitor Information Centre.
"I think they're brilliant," Ann said, adding their even more spectacular of a night with the pathway featuring the UETA winners lit up.
The original Wall of Fame was a real community effort and the plaques will be relocated from there to the new location.
