Cheyenne Fans Of The King Don’t Care That Elvis Never Performed In Wyoming

Nearly 50 years after his death, Elvis remains forever 25 and the undisputed “King of Rock ‘N’ Roll” at the corner of East Lincolnway and Campbell Avenue just outside Cheyenne’s historic downtown district.

That’s where The King has held a permanent residency for 29 years at the R&B Breakfast Club, a tiny diner famous for its breakfast burritos, fast service, and huge collection of everything Elvis.

The only spot not covered with photos, paintings, records and other memorabilia dedicated to Elvis’ rise to superstar status in the 1950s and 1960s was the building’s outside west-facing wall.

Now that’s taken as well with the unveiling of a huge mural that merges Elvis, Wyoming and the Cowboy Code in an eclectic way that somehow works, even though during his life The King never performed here.

The mural is the work of Cheyenne artist James Overstreet, and features a larger-than-life Elvis with his trademark black leather jacket and acoustic guitar rising behind a stampeding herd of bison with the Tetons and Devils Tower in the background.

The realistic details of The King’s face and the bison were created with spray paint and are set off by striking streaks of vivid color that Overstreet is known for.

“That was my first time ever trying to do realism with spray paint,” Overstreet told Cowboy State Daily. 

The challenge was capturing owner Valerie Martin’s vision for the mural — feature Elvis, yet make it Wyoming-themed, he said.

While daunting at first because Elvis typically isn’t associated with having a strong connection to the Cowboy State, Overstreet said that doesn’t really matter. Wyoming is iconic in its own way, and The King has universal appeal.

“I got some imagery of Elvis, and then just combined it with some other stuff I was doing,” he said. “Then I tweaked it even more because I like to challenge myself with each project — changing the color scheme and the style.”

That meant using more earth tones that Overstreet is used to. Much of his work features vibrant, eclectic combinations of colors. He keeps that in the streaks of yellows, oranges and purples that emanate from around Elvis, giving the impression he’s playing and singing.

It’s a talking point that since it was finished this week has been turning heads and enticing people to stop and take selfies with the mural.

‘Pretty Awesome’

That’s what Molly Kopp of Laramie and her 15-year-old son Radley were doing Thursday morning after eating at the diner.

“We had come to Cheyenne for a doctor’s appointment, and he’s just always loved Elvis,” Molly said. “We heard about this new mural and had to see it.”

The mural “is pretty awesome,” Radley said.

“I like how it brings everything this restaurant is about together,” he added. “Because it’s a local Wyoming restaurant and it represents Elvis. It’s really bright and I think it’s really cool.”

Unlike many of his teenaged friends, Radley said he’s a genuine Elvis fan, and “In the Ghetto” is his favorite song by The King.

He attributes being a fan to television.

“When I was in third grade, I really liked watching ‘Full House,’ and a character in the show named Jesse really liked Elvis,” Radley said. “So, I became an Elvis fan.”

He loves “how extreme” the R&B is, with nearly every inch inside covered with Elvis memorabilia, and a couple of near life-sized cutouts.

He also likes the diner’s pancakes: “I’ve always been a pancake person.”

The teen also admits there’s not much of an actual Wyoming connection with Elvis, but that doesn’t matter.

“Yeah, Elvis really isn’t a Wyoming guy, but he had a country phase back in, like, the late ’60s,” Radley said. “But he definitely was not a Wyoming artist.”

Had A Drink At The Virginian

Elvis may have never performed in the Cowboy State, but there are a couple of notable intersections between the King of Rock ‘N’ Roll and Wyoming.

The first came in 1954 just before he was launched into stardom when Elvis had a drink during a stop at The Virginian in Medicine Bow. 

Margaret Parr was 11 when she started washing dishes at The Virginian, then she graduated to waiting tables and finally to sometimes tending bar, she told Cowboy State Daily in 2023.

And so it was that one night at The Virginian when Elvis Presley happened to walk through the door at the hotel restaurant that Parr, too young to drink herself, was not only waiting tables, but tending the bar. 

Eventually, Presley decided he wanted a cocktail. Parr had him tell her the ingredients before she left the dining room to go into the bar and make his drink.  

Elvis’ second mark on Wyoming is a sad story about how he indirectly helped create a divided highway in the middle of nowhere.

Before it was a back road between Rock River and Bosler, U.S. Highway 30 was one of Wyoming’s busiest stretches of road. 

It even gained the nickname “Blood Alley” because of the high number of fatal crashes there, including a collision that killed one of Elvis Presley’s movie co-stars.

That’s why there’s roughly 19 miles of wide-open four-lane pavement along the route between Rock River and Bosler, even though now it seems strange to hit a seemingly arbitrary section of divided highway in the middle of nowhere.

Actress Judy Tyler and her husband were killed in a collision near Rock River on July 3, 1957. Tyler had just finished filming “Jailhouse Rock,” in which she co-starred with Presley.

Tyler and her husband were driving from Los Angeles to New York when they were killed.

And let’s not forget Elvis, a popular dappled gray wild Wyoming stallion that was part of a federal Bureau of Land Management roundup in 2024.

Public outcry over taking Elvis the stallion prompted the agency to release him back into the wild.

Artist Grew Up There

For Overstreet, the mural is more than a commission, it’s an homage to his hometown and the neighborhood he grew up in.

“I grew up in that neighborhood just a few blocks away, and I’ve been going there all my life,” he said. “To even think that I could make art a career, to even think to make art a career in Cheyenne, Wyoming, I never, never could have imagined that could be possible.”

He said the Elvis mural “is a dream come true, and specifically that location with me growing up there. It just brings a whole new sense of community, not just for myself, but the actual community and helping each other grow and inspire the city.”

Overstreet said his go-to order at the R&B is a breakfast burrito, smothered in half green and half red chili. 

Now he’s more than a longtime customer and fan, he’s contributing to its rock ‘n’ roll vibe.

That people are stopping to look at and take selfies with the mural is something Overstreet finds very satisfying.

“I guess that just shows how big of an icon Elvis is and how he, you know, continues to transcend generations and impact our world,” he said. “Music is a big, big part of who we are as human beings, so that’s pretty cool.”

Martin said that it doesn’t matter that Elvis doesn’t have a physical connection to Wyoming, because his music does.

“Yeah, I guess that’s right. He never did play in Wyoming, but that doesn’t matter here,” she said between checking customers in and out on a typical harried Thursday morning rush.

It’s a rush that lasts from open to close every day at a joint that jumps almost as much as a 1950s jukebox blasting out “Jailhouse Rock.”

“I’ve owned this for six years, and it was already packed with Elvis stuff,” Martin said, explaining how former owners Bill and Rose Garcia opened the diner in 1997 and made it a shrine to their love for Elvis the Pelvis.

Instead of changing the R&B Breakfast Club when she bought the place, Martin embraced its rock ‘n’ roll kitsch and dedication to Elvis fandom.

Martin said people from all over send her Elvis stuff, even though there’s not an inch left to display it inside the restaurant.

But that doesn’t mean there will be no more new Elvis images at the R&B. There’s room on the outside of a shed behind the building.

Contact Greg Johnson at greg@cowboystatedaily.com

Greg Johnson can be reached at greg@cowboystatedaily.com.