Can you imagine what the world would have been like, if the twin brother born before Elvis Presley had lived? Would he have survived longer? Would life have been different enough, that he would have found a way to hold onto his success, and his health?

Elvis Aron Presley was born January 8, 1935, shortly after a stillborn brother, named Jesse Garon Presley, for their paternal grandfather. Jesse’s tiny body was placed in a cardboard box, and buried the next day in an unmarked grave in the Priceville Cemetery, Tupelo, Mississippi.

According to clinical psychologist Peter Whitmer, author of the 1996 book “The Inner Elvis”, twins often spend their lives trying to be two people, to make up for the loss of their twin.

His mother Gladys would one day say that Jesse’s death and Elvis’s survival was what enabled Presley to “do great things”. Whitmer on the other hand, states that surviving twins are torn between wanting to achieve their own uniqueness, and filling an emptiness left by the missing half of their self.

According to family and friends, Presley would go to the cemetery in later years and talk to Jesse, and feel comforted, even though nobody had ever been able to pinpoint the exact location of his grave. An attempt before his death by father Vernon Presley, found him unable to remember.

Presley had his mother’s remains interred at Graceland, where on his death, Vernon was buried beside her. A stone was also erected for Jesse.