{"id":825716,"date":"2026-08-25T21:06:25","date_gmt":"2026-08-25T21:06:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/825716\/"},"modified":"2026-08-25T21:06:25","modified_gmt":"2026-08-25T21:06:25","slug":"dolly-parton-country-music-icon-dies-at-80","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/825716\/","title":{"rendered":"Dolly Parton, country music icon, dies at 80"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dolly Parton, who rose from a loving if impoverished upbringing in the mountains of East Tennessee to become the \u201cQueen of Country\u201d music, a Hollywood star and a beloved American icon, has died, her family announced Tuesday.<\/p>\n

She was 80. <\/p>\n

Parton\u2019s nephew, Brian Seaver, announced the news in a video posted on her Instagram. He did not provide details about her death.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy name is Brian Seaver, son of Cassie Parton, and I\u2019m representing the Parton and Owens family today announcing the passing of my aunt, Dolly Rebecca Parton Dean, Sister, Sis and Granny to one generation and Gigi to the next,\u201d Seaver said in a video.<\/p>\n

\"DollyDolly Parton in 1970. Michael Ochs Archives \/ Getty Images file<\/p>\n

\u201cThis video announcement is something Dolly asked of me years ago, before I fully absorbed it as a future reality. As her head of security for more than two decades, a role my father Larry held before me, I have imagined the heaviness of this moment but haven\u2019t truly felt it til now,\u201d he added. <\/p>\n

Seaver added that Parton \u201clived in the light and is in the arms of Jesus, surely met by (her late husband) Carl, her parents, and countless others.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cRest in peace, Aunt Dolly \u2014 Aunt, Granny, Gigi. May God bless Dolly Parton, and may God bless you all. She will always love you,\u201d Seaver said at the end of the video statement. <\/p>\n

As word of Parton\u2019s death spread, the tributes began pouring in.<\/p>\n

President Donald Trump ordered U.S. flags lowered to half-staff nationwide for one week while a constellation of the entertainment world\u2019s biggest stars weighed in with condolences.<\/p>\n

Her death comes after Parton announced in May that she was canceling a Las Vegas show and had been undergoing treatment for kidney stones for several years.<\/p>\n

“Lord, they dig more stones out of me a year than the rock quarry in Rockwood, Tennessee,” Parton said in a statement. “But seriously, my immune system and my digestive system got all out of whack over the past couple three years, and they\u2019re working real hard on rebuilding and strengthening those, and hopefully, I\u2019ll be up to snuff again soon.”<\/p>\n

On Friday, Parton acknowledged she had lost a step after her husband Carl Dean died in March 2025. But she insisted she wasn\u2019t ready to leave the stage.<\/p>\n

\u201cEven though I\u2019m still healin,\u2019\u201d Parton told People<\/a>. \u201cI\u2019m still workin\u2019! You know me \u2014 as I\u2019ve often said \u2014 I\u2019ve dreamed myself into a corner, and I still have so many things I want to achieve, so I\u2019m gonna keep on working as long as I can to see everything come to life.\u201d<\/p>\n

During her more than 60-year career, Parton sold over 100 million records and won 11 Grammy Awards, making her one of the bestselling musical performers of all time.<\/p>\n

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Parton also became a star on the silver screen, gaining a whole new audience and critical acclaim when she brought her Southern charm to movies like \u201c9 to 5\u201d (she wrote and sang the theme song), \u201cSteel Magnolias\u201d and “The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas.”<\/p>\n

Bedecked in blonde bouffant hairdos and never without her makeup, Parton also became one of the nation\u2019s best-known brands who parried questions about her hourglass figure and augmented breasts with her signature self-deprecating wit<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt costs a lot of money to look this cheap,\u201d Parton once said. <\/p>\n

\"ColinColin Higgins, Jane Fonda, Lily Tomlin, and Dolly Parton on the set of the film “9 to 5” in 1979.Steve Schapiro \/ Corbis via Getty Images file<\/p>\n

Parton was a shrewd businesswoman who amassed an estimated $650 million fortune and maintained creative control in the cutthroat and male-dominated music industry. She presided over an entertainment empire that included the Dollywood theme park. And she was a devoted philanthropist who launched the Dollywood Foundation to provide poverty relief and fund educational programs in her native East Tennessee.<\/p>\n

Never shy at expressing her Christian faith, Parton was also a public supporter of the LGBTQ community who advocated for marriage equality and spoke up in defense of transgender people.<\/p>\n

\u201cI keep saying: If you\u2019re the fine Christian that you think you are, why are you judging people,\u201d Parton said<\/a> during a 2017 interview with Larry King. \u201cThat\u2019s God\u2019s job.\u201d<\/p>\n

Along those lines, she jokingly told a British outlet a few years earlier<\/a>: \u201cI think gay couples should be allowed to marry. They should suffer just like us heterosexuals.\u201d<\/p>\n

Through it all Parton leaned on the love of her life, her husband Carl, who died at 82 and who, from the moment they married in 1966, happily ceded the spotlight to his world-famous wife. <\/p>\n

\"DollyDolly Parton in a rare photo with her husband, Carl Thomas Dean. dollyparton.com<\/p>\n

\u201cWords can\u2019t do justice to the love we shared for over 60 years,\u201d Parton said in July 2025<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Born Jan. 19, 1946,<\/a> in a one-room cabin on the banks of the Little Pigeon River near the town of Sevierville, Parton was the fourth of 12 children. <\/p>\n

Her father, Robert Lee Parton, could not read or write and often supplemented the family’s meager income from their farm by working construction jobs.<\/p>\n

Her mother, Avie Lee Parton, ran the household and was fond of singing traditional Appalachian ballads. The future superstar said it was her mother who instilled in her a love for music. <\/p>\n

\"AParton had an affinity for music from a young age.Michael Ochs Archives \/ Getty Images file<\/p>\n

And it was at church that Parton started performing. By age 13, she was singing on local radio and television shows and made her debut at the Grand Ole Opry, where she met Johnny Cash. <\/p>\n

\u201cDolly Parton has one of the most distinctive voices in American pop music,\u201d Katherine Dacey<\/a>, a professor at the Berklee College of Music, told NBC News before Parton\u2019s death. \u201cHer high soprano voice gets its distinctive character from her fast vibrato and vocal twang.\u201d<\/p>\n

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The day after she graduated from Sevier County High School in 1964, Parton headed to Nashville, where she first made her mark writing songs for other performers, some of them with her uncle Bill Owens.<\/p>\n

In songs like \u201cTennessee Homesick Blues\u201d and \u201cCoat of Many Colors,\u201d Parton drew inspiration from her hardscrabble childhood.<\/p>\n

\"DollyParton performs in 1976.David Redfern \/ Getty Images file<\/p>\n

Three years after leaving school, Parton released her first record, \u201cHello, I’m Dolly,\u201d and caught the attention of country star Porter Wagoner and became a regular on his shows. <\/p>\n

Then, in 1974, Parton broke out on her own when she topped the country charts for the first time with a song she wrote and performed called \u201cJolene.\u201d She later revealed it was inspired by a bank teller who flirted with her husband when they were newlyweds.<\/p>\n

Her next four singles were also country chart toppers and one of them, \u201cI Will Always Love You,\u201d later became a huge hit for Whitney Houston in 1992. <\/p>\n

Parton also won her first Grammy with a single from that record called \u201cHere You Come Again.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"DollyParton performs in 1995. Ron Davis \/ Getty Images file<\/p>\n

Parton, who earned a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in 1984, made several more movies and performed around the world, but she always returned to the music that first made her famous \u2014 and to the hollers of East Tennessee where she was born and where she and her husband made their home. <\/p>\n

\u201cNever ignore your roots \u2014 your home or your hair,\u201d she once said<\/a>.<\/p>\n

In 1986, Parton opened the Dollywood theme park in the Great Smoky Mountains near her hometown. The 165 acres include roller coasters, a bald eagle sanctuary and music and crafts that pay tribute to the region’s Appalachian heritage.<\/p>\n

\"DollyParton at Dollywood in Pigeon Forge, Tenn., in 1988.Ron Davis \/ Getty Images file<\/p>\n

Parton and her husband never had children. And in public statements, Parton said she \u201cbelieved that God didn\u2019t mean for me to have kids.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSince I had no kids, and my husband was pretty independent, I had freedom,\u201d Parton told Oprah Winfrey <\/a>in 2020. \u201cSo I think a big part of my whole success is the fact that I was free to work.\u201d<\/p>\n

Parton also left her fans guessing about her politics, although in 2016 she angered many Republicans by saying that Hillary Clinton was \u201cvery qualified\u201d to be president.<\/p>\n

In an online post<\/a>, Parton insisted she was not endorsing Clinton or Clinton’s then-rival, Donald Trump. <\/p>\n

\u201cI try not to get political but if I am, I might as well just run myself \u2018cause I\u2019ve got the hair for it, it\u2019s huge, and they could always use more boobs in the race,\u201d she wrote. <\/p>\n

While she generally dodged commenting on partisan politics, Parton was hailed in 2020 for helping to fund research at Vanderbilt University that led to the development of Moderna’s Covid vaccine. <\/p>\n

\u201cMy longtime friend Dr. Naji Abumrad, who\u2019s been involved in research at Vanderbilt for many years, informed me that they were making some exciting advancements towards research of the coronavirus for a cure,\u201d Parton tweeted<\/a> in April 2020, as much of the nation was under lockdown. She added that she would be donating $1 million to the research.<\/p>\n

Abumrad, who treated Parton when she was in a car accident in 2013, became friends with the country star afterward. <\/p>\n

\u201cWithout a doubt in my mind, her funding made the research toward the vaccine go 10 times faster than it would be without it,\u201d he told The Washington Post in November 2020<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Parton’s philanthropic legacy also includes the creation of the Imagination Library<\/a>, which mails free books to children around the world. In the three decades since it was founded, the organization has mailed more than 300 million books to kids around the U.S., as well as Canada, Australia, the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland.<\/p>\n

\"DollyParton receiving a Kennedy Center Honor in 2006.Manuel Balce Ceneta \/ AP file<\/p>\n

The initiative was inspired by Parton\u2019s father, who was illiterate. Parton often spoke about his intelligence and strength of character but said she believed his inability to read and write held him back. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhen I got this idea to do the Imagination Library, I wanted to get Daddy involved in it. I wanted him to help me with that so he could take the pride in that and so he did,\u201d she wrote on her website in 2020<\/a>. \u201cHe got to live long enough to hear the kids call me the Book Lady.\u201d<\/p>\n