Matt Bellner was at his parent’s house in Longview, Texas, last week when he started to look around the house for possibly valuable relics.
About an hour and a half into the search, his father, Bill, took something out of his wallet and asked, “Does this have any value?”
Bellner, a collector himself, stared at the item his dad handed him.
It was a Nov. 22, 1956, ticket to see Elvis Presley perform in Toledo, Ohio.
Bellner looked on grader PSA’s website and found just 14 Elvis tickets have been graded from the singer's breakout year of 1956. Tickets graded from the concert his father just handed him? Zero.
When Bellner asked his father why he had it in his wallet, his father said it was where he took his wife of 66 years, Darlene, on their first date.
Bill and Darlene went to a Catholic high school and were required to attend church. One day, when Bill walked into church, Darlene said, “That’s the man I’m going to marry.”
But first came the first date.
Bill was a fan of the 21-year-old mover and shaker, whose movie “Love Me Tender” came out the night before, and he wasn’t a bit worried his date would pay more attention to him than Elvis.
“I was definitely more into Bill,” Darlene said, 68 years later.
Bill, who paid $4 for the two tickets, says the two were far back enough that night they could pretty much just hear Presley, but not see his moves. The budding superstar appeared on stage for about 30 minutes, with other vaudeville type acts surrounding him.
And since that night, the ticket stayed in Bill's wallet, which has undergone several transfers. So, how is the ink still readable?
Besides never leaving his wallet in his pants for a laundry cycle or falling in the lake while fishing, Bill took precautions.
“Not only was it in the second part of wallet, but there was another ticket in front if it,” Bill said.
That ticket? A 1958 movie ticket to see "South Pacific," which Bill and Darlene saw on their honeymoon in Detroit.
At 83, Bill said it’s time to let the Elvis ticket go, especially now he knows it’s worth something.
Matt posted the ticket on eBay, and it closes Monday night before midnight ET. As of Sunday night at 9pm ET, it had received 11 bids with a high bid of $560.
Darren Rovell is the founder of cllct.com and one of the country's leading reporters on the collectibles market. He previously worked for ESPN, CNBC and The Action Network.