Eddie Clontz, the king of the American supermarket tabloids who published the ''Elvis is Alive'' story that produced Elvis sightings around the world, has died aged 56.
It was 1988 when Clontz, the editor of World Weekly News, issued his famous Elvis story with the subheading ''King of Rock 'n' Roll Faked His Death and Is Living in Kalamazoo, Michigan''. The paper tripled its normal circulation to well over a million copies and the Elvis Lives industry was launched.
Clontz and his paper cashed in on the story for years until 1993 when they revealed exclusively : ''Elvis Dead at 58'', but a few weeks later they disclosed that Elvis's death was a hoax and it was back to business as usual.
Among his other top stories were: ''12 US Senators are Space Aliens''; ''Blind Man Regains Sight and Dumps Ugly Wife''; and he revealed the existence of baby ghosts which led to nearly 1000 readers writing in to adopt.
Clontz's motto was ''Never question yourself out of a good story'' and he admitted that if we inform people ''it's usually an accident''.
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