Before the first note ever reaches a turntable, the story begins with Charley Davis’ custom built shelves. Thousands upon thousands of vinyl records — neatly stacked floor to ceiling, spanning generations of music and history — transform the front room of his Vardaman, Mississippi home into a time capsule where every album tells a story.
Rows upon rows of vinyl albums, stacks of 45s, eight-track tapes, cassettes, even reel-to-reel recordings fill what has become less a room than a museum of American music.
Every alphabetized shelf tells a story. Every album has a history. Every sleeve and colored label represents another piece of a lifetime spent preserving memories that many people simply threw away.
For Davis, the collection has never been about owning thousands of records.
“It’s about saving history,” he said.
His love affair with music began in the 1970s.
After saving nickels and dimes, he walked into A&Z Dry Goods on Main Street in Vardaman and bought the first record he ever purchased with his own money — Kenny Rogers’ “The Gambler.” It remains one of his favorite memories, not because of its value, but because it marked the beginning of a lifelong passion.
That passion has grown into a collection numbering roughly 4,500 albums, more than 4,000 45-rpm records, around 2,500 eight-track tapes, nearly 1,000 cassettes, countless CDs and reel-to-reel recordings, along with vintage stereos and jukeboxes that still play music decades after they were built.
Many collectors chase rare records. Davis chases stories.
He knows where nearly every record came from, remembers friends who gave him albums years ago, and can walk directly to a specific title without hesitation because the collection has remained alphabetized since it was small enough to fit in a single cabinet belonging to his parents – Bill and Carolyn Davis.
“That’s just how I’ve always done it,” Davis said of his meticulously organized collection.
That original cabinet — his parents’ first record cabinet — still sits in the room today, a reminder of how far the collection has grown.
The shelves surrounding it were built decades ago in Joel Williams’ agriculture shop class at Vardaman High School in the late ‘80s and have been expanded again and again as the collection continued to outgrow its space.
Unlike many collectors, he believes records should be played.
“People ask me all the time, do you actually play all those records,” Davis smiled. “Absolutely I do.”
Near a pristine, brightly lit green and yellow “Rock-Ola” juke box sits an old Magnavox chest-like stereo that also fills the house with music.
“Listen to how good this still sounds,” Davis said as he popped an eight-track in. “I could upset my neighbors if I wanted to.”
He repairs eight-track tapes that others consider worthless, replacing worn pressure pads and repairing broken splices. Many tapes people discarded decades ago can be restored to nearly perfect condition.
“We threw away a lot of things back then that weren’t really broken,” he said.
His fascination extends beyond the music itself.
He studies original pressings, promotional releases and manufacturing differences that casual listeners never notice. He can explain why one Elvis Presley album is worth only a few dollars while another, nearly identical version, can command thousands. He searches for obscure pressings, radio station copies and packaging variations that reveal the history behind the music industry.
Elvis remains at the center of the collection.
“It’s hard to pick one favorite but it would have to be Elvis,” Davis said. “It’s really all about the music I grew up hearing like Charlie Pride. I never got into the 80s and 90s rock music like some of my friends. I tended to go back in time.”
He has spent decades studying Presley recordings, rare releases and RCA pressing variations. Yet his shelves also include Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Charlie Pride, Waylon Jennings, Marty Robbins, the Eagles, Jimmy Buffett, Larry Gatlin and countless other artists spanning nearly every genre.
Many of his albums, such as his Larry Gatlin collection, are signed. He came to know Gatlin and his band over the years and shared many of his album duplicates with him.
“I’d go see him when he would play at Sam’s Town (in Tunica) and he’d say, ‘What have you got for me this time?’” Davis laughed.
The collection is as much about preserving memories as preserving music.
He recalls listening to records with his parents, singing along to homemade accompaniment tapes and working as a disc jockey during the early 1990s. Those experiences shaped not only his musical tastes but his appreciation for the stories hidden behind every recording.
His dedication to preservation, however, reaches far beyond music.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, while much of the world slowed down, he began restoring decades of damaged school composite photographs from Vardaman High School. Using digital editing, he repaired water damage, recreated missing names and even colorized older black-and-white composites before donating the restored images back to the school.
“They belong to the school,” Davis said. “That’s where they should be. I just wanted to make sure they were preserved. I’ve done all up to 2000. I’ve still got to finish from there to current day.”
He also collected every yearbook and intends to scan all of those and put online so former students can once again revisit memories that had faded with time.
“I don’t get concerned with costs,” Davis said. “Preserving the history is what’s important to me.”
His collection continues to grow. Record stores recognize him as a regular customer. Duplicate albums often become trade credit toward another elusive treasure.
He still dreams of finding a few records that have escaped him for decades.
“A signed Elvis original would be the one I don’t have but want, but they are incredibly hard to find,” Davis said.
Standing among thousands of albums, his vintage jukeboxes and shelves filled with musical history, it’s clear the search has never really been about completing a collection for Davis. It’s about making sure the soundtrack of generations is never forgotten.