Dolly Parton: A Hometown Is Heartbroken
The world is mourning right now.
Our specific hometown community of Sevier County, Tennessee, has been knocked off its axis. Our foundation of everything has been tilted.
Dolly Parton has died at the age of 80.
And while the entire world is grieving an icon, here in the Smoky Mountains, it feels deeply personal.
I met so many people this weekend in our beautiful Smoky Mountains and saw celebrities and rock fans alike wearing Dolly Parton shirts at the Mountain Music Festival. I made sure to tell them how amazing she has been to our hometown.
You can’t imagine what she means to us.
Her Imagination Library. The Dolly Parton Birthing Unit at our local hospital. The Dolly Parton Center for Women’s Services. And most recently, East Tennessee Children’s Hospital officially becoming Dolly Parton Children’s Hospital — a collaboration described by hospital leadership as transformational for pediatric healthcare in our region. Her commitment to the hospital was described as “generational and transformational.”
Her generosity here is far too much to list.
I had the pleasure of seeing her perform in Nashville last year at DOLLY: A True Original Musical, based on her remarkable rags-to-riches life. Today, that memory feels different.
Because Dolly’s story really did begin right here.
Born Dolly Rebecca Parton on January 19, 1946, in Sevier County, Tennessee, she was the fourth of 12 children. She grew up poor in the mountains of Sevier County, began singing in church and was performing on local television while still a child. At only 13, she appeared at the Grand Ole Opry.
The little girl from the mountains would go on to become one of the most recognizable entertainers in the world.
A Career Almost Impossible to Measure
Dolly’s career spanned more than six decades — and seven decades on the country charts.
She sold more than 100 million records worldwide.
She estimated that she had written approximately 3,000 songs throughout her life.
She earned 26 No. 1 songs on Billboard’s country charts, a record for a female artist, along with 42 career Top 10 country albums and more than 100 charted singles.
She won 10 competitive Grammy Awards and received the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award, with more than 50 Grammy nominations.
She was named the Country Music Association’s Entertainer of the Year in 1978, at a time when very few women had received the honor.
She was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame in 1999 and, more than two decades later, into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2022.
She received two Academy Award nominations, as well as Emmy and Tony nominations, crossing boundaries between country music, pop music, film, television and Broadway.
And then there were the songs.
“Jolene.”
“Coat of Many Colors.”
“9 to 5.”
“Here You Come Again.”
“I Will Always Love You.”
Songs that became bigger than hits. They became pieces of American culture.
“I Will Always Love You” was already Dolly’s song long before Whitney Houston’s extraordinary recording introduced it to another generation. Dolly had also famously refused to surrender half of the song’s publishing rights when Elvis Presley’s manager wanted Elvis to record it — a business decision that became one of the legendary stories of her career.
She wasn’t only an entertainer. Dolly understood the business of being Dolly.
Far Beyond Country Music
Hollywood came calling, too.
Her starring role alongside Jane Fonda and Lily Tomlin in 9 to 5 made Dolly a movie star and gave the world another one of her signature songs.
She went on to star in The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, Rhinestone, Steel Magnolias, Straight Talk and other films and television projects.
Behind the scenes, she was a businesswoman and producer as well. Her production company, Sandollar, was involved in projects including Buffy the Vampire Slayer and the Father of the Bride films.
And in 1986, she put her name on something much closer to home.
Dollywood.
What grew from that partnership became one of Tennessee’s best-known destinations, bringing millions of visitors to the Smoky Mountains and providing jobs and economic opportunity to the region Dolly never stopped calling home.
But Dolly’s greatest accomplishments can’t all be measured in ticket sales, chart positions or trophies.
More Than 300 Million Books
In 1995, Dolly launched the Imagination Library right here in Sevier County.
Her inspiration was her father, Robert Lee Parton, whom Dolly described as one of the smartest people she knew despite the fact that he could not read or write.
The idea was remarkably simple: give children books.
Every month. Free of charge. From birth until age five.
What began as a program for the children of Dolly’s hometown grew far beyond anything Sevier County could have imagined.
By the end of 2025, Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library had gifted 304,539,509 books since its creation.
More than 40 million books were mailed in 2025 alone.
Today, children in five countries participate in a program that started right here at home.
Think about that for a minute.
More than 300 million books because one daughter remembered how hard it had been for her daddy not to be able to read.
That’s Dolly.
When Her People Needed Her
And when Sevier County suffered one of its darkest moments, Dolly showed exactly what “home” meant to her.
After the devastating 2016 wildfires destroyed homes and took lives in Gatlinburg and the surrounding area, Dolly created the My People Fund to put money directly into the hands of families who had lost their homes.
Not somewhere else.
Her people.
Her mountains.
Her home.
Her generosity extended far beyond Tennessee as well. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Dolly donated $1 million to Vanderbilt University Medical Center, helping fund research associated with development of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine. Her foundation has supported scholarships, education and disaster relief.
And earlier this year came another remarkable commitment to East Tennessee.
East Tennessee Children’s Hospital officially became Dolly Parton Children’s Hospital in February 2026.
Dolly’s involvement wasn’t simply ceremonial. Hospital leadership later described her financial commitment as “generational and transformational,” saying it would help expand medical staff, programs, technology and the hospital’s ability to care for children throughout East Tennessee for years to come.
It was one more example of something people here have known for decades:
Dolly never forgot where she came from.
Our Hometown Girl
She could have belonged solely to Nashville.
Or Hollywood.
Or New York.
Or any of the stages around the world where people knew her name.
But somehow, through all of it, she remained unmistakably ours.
She talked about these mountains.
She sang about these mountains.
She invested in these mountains.
She created jobs here. Educated children here. Helped families here. Supported healthcare here.
She took the place she came from with her everywhere she went — and then spent a lifetime giving back to it.
Her husband, Carl Dean, whom Dolly married in 1966, died in March 2025 after nearly 59 years of marriage. Behind one of the most public careers imaginable was a marriage they managed to keep remarkably private.
Today, it is difficult to even begin putting Dolly Parton’s life into numbers.
Ten Grammys.
More than 100 million records.
Thousands of songs.
Twenty-six No. 1 country hits.
More than 300 million children’s books.
Movies. Businesses. Awards. Scholarships. Jobs. Healthcare. Disaster relief.
But those numbers still don’t explain Dolly.
Maybe you have to be from here to completely understand it.
If you’re in town and see people walking around crying today, give them a hug.
They’re grieving a tremendous loss.
The world lost one of its greatest entertainers.
Country music lost one of the people who helped define it.
Millions of children lost the woman who made sure a new book arrived in their mailbox every month.
And here in Sevier County, we lost our hometown girl.
The little girl from Locust Ridge went out into the world and became Dolly Parton.
But she never stopped coming home.
Prayers for her family, her friends, our community and truly the world. ❤️
