Lowell Hays Elvis Chai Pendant necklaceWear the Symbol Elvis Never Took Off In the final years of his life, Elvis Presley was rarely seen without it a gleaming chai pendant, the Hebrew word for life, resting against his chest. It wasn't a stage prop. It was personal. Elvis's maternal great great grandmother was a Jewish woman named Nancy Burdine, whose family immigrated to America from what is now Lithuania around the time of the American Revolution. That heritage quietly shaped the King