| Sources |
- [S27] The Daily Times, http://www.thedailytimes.com/, (Blount County, Tennessee), 2 Apr 2005.
Dolly Parton promises growth at park
2005-04-02
by Duncan Mansfield
The Associated Press
PIGEON FORGE -- Singing ``Hurray for Dollywood,'' Dolly Parton marked the 20th anniversary of her Smoky Mountain theme park Friday with goals of doubling attendance and putting another $160 million into the park over the next two decades.
``We are just getting started,'' she told the opening-day crowd. ``We are going to keep dreaming and continuing to grow ... and prove that we are one of the best theme parks in the whole wide world.''
Parton said during an interview with The Associated Press that the future may also include a Dollywood resort hotel in Pigeon Forge, additions to Dollywood's dinner-horse theater Dixie Stampede and water park Splash Country, and maybe even a Dollywood II or Dollywood III.
``But it will have to make good sense,'' said Parton, who backed away from a proposed Dollywood II in Japan a few years ago.
Nashville, which lost its Opryland amusement park in the 1990s, could be Dolly's next target.
``They don't have a theme park there now and someone will have eventually, and we are looking to that possibility,'' Parton said. ``Whether or not that ever happens, I don't know.''
As part of the 20th anniversary celebration Friday, a 1982 interview was played in which Parton told Barbara Walters she had a dream for a theme park back home in the Tennessee hills that would be ``sort of a fantasy city ... a Smoky Mountain fairy land.''
Perhaps only Parton could foresee how it would turn out.
The 125-acre Dollywood features more than 30 mountain-themed rides and attractions, musical shows from country to gospel, and native craftsmen. It drew more than 2.2 million visitors in 2004, making it the top paid tourist attraction in Tennessee -- nearly four times as many visitors as traveled to Elvis Presley's Graceland in Memphis.
Dollywood also ranked 28th out of more than 400 U.S. parks in attendance last year, according to the trade publication Amusement Business. Its attendance already tops some Six Flags parks though still is dwarfed by No. 1 Magic Kingdom at Disneyworld at 15 million.
``They have a formula there that is working for them, and they have got some terrific products to promote,'' said Bill Hardman, president and CEO of the Southeast Tourism Society in Atlanta.
Parton partnered in 1985 with Branson, Mo.-based Herschend Enterprises to convert their modest Silver Dollar City in Pigeon Forge into Dollywood. Attendance doubled in a year, and the local economy boomed as outlet malls, music theaters and restaurants sprang up.
The mountain resort town of 5,456 residents recorded $714 million in gross business receipts last year. In July, alone, Pigeon Forge brought in nearly as much money as in all of 1984, before Dollywood arrived.
``There was a wonderful number of people coming in,'' said Susan Whitaker, Tennessee commissioner for tourism development. ``But when Dolly put her name to that theme park, that changed everything.''
Jack Herschend credits Parton's business savvy, starting with a suggestion to build a ``museum'' of her mementos at the park.
``I thought, `Oh my gosh, there's a yawner.' And it turned out to be tremendously successful,'' he said. ``I don't know how she does it. She has a sense of what people want.''
Parton says she didn't get into Dollywood for personal wealth but to help her native Sevier County in the Appalachians. Dollywood employs more than 2,000 people, including at times most of Parton's 289 kinfolk.
``I was just feeling Dollywood would do a lot of good for the folks back here because I have watched my family and other families around here struggle to make ends meet,'' she said.
``I wanted to create a place where families can have fun and also to give folks good work and have enough money to raise a good family of their own.''
So what will Dollywood look like in 20 years?
``Well, you never know,'' the 59-year-old Parton said brightly.
``You try to set up these things in your lifetime that will still go and be just as good or better after you are gone,'' she said. ``So if you do your job right ... it will carry on.''
- [S106] The Mountain Press, 21 Jun 2006.
With no plans to slow down, Dolly enjoys life, laughs, and a busy career
Sevier County's most famous citizen, Dolly Parton, made one of her annual appearances at Dollywood Friday to promote this year's KidsFest.
She made time for an interview with reporter J.J. Kindred of her hometown paper, The Mountain Press.
TMP: After all these years of doing almost everything, how do you manage to stay on top, especially with all the younger stars out there?
Parton: Well, I get up early and I stay up late (laughs). I keep my eye on it and my nose to the grindstone. I always try to stay in the mainstream - I like watching what everybody else is doing. I just love my work, and I'm not in any competition except for myself to make or break my own records. As long as I'm healthy enough to, I'm gonna go.
TMP: Do you ever go out in public to do regular things? For example, when was the last time you actually went to the grocery store?
Parton: I don't have to go to the grocery store much any more. My husband does most of that stuff or I have someone helping me out with that. I still go to restaurants, but you know when to go and where to go. I don't mind the people. If I need something, I just dart right in to the store and get it. There's a place in Sevierville - and I'm not gonna say what it is - that makes great slaw dogs, and I go in and get my own dogs a lot of times. There are just some things I'm gonna do and no one's gonna stop me.
TMP: What would you consider your favorite recipe out of your new cookbook?
Parton: Actually, there's a lot of great recipes. Some of my favorite recipes are some of the things my husband's mother used to cook for him when he was little, and I still cook for him a lot. I love that I got a chance to put some of those recipes in, like the chili spaghetti. My mother had great stuff like meat loaf, chicken and dumplings, and most of my family's recipes are the real country foods. I never met a food I didn't like (laughs).
TMP: Would you ever consider running for public office, like governor?
Parton: No, but I've been asked that seriously a while back. Show business is close enough to politics, and I'm too honest. They'd kick me out right away. I'm not really smart enough to do that. My daddy used to have a sticker on the bumper of his pickup truck that said, "Dolly Parton for President," and I always got a kick out of that. But I'll leave the politics to other people.
TMP: Are there any plans to further expand your Imagination Library?
Parton: We hope to expand it all over the country and all over the world. We're going into Canada now and we're all over Tennessee. We've sent out three million books this year. We're in lots and lots of states and lots and lots of counties, so we hope to at least in all of America have books for all children. It doesn't matter who you are, if you're rich or poor, you'll get those books, if you're at that age from the time you were born until you start kindergarten.
TMP: Who would you consider as your closest celebrity friends?
Parton: I don't really hang out with any of them. When I do have some time off, I usually stay home. The people I'm very close to are people like Alison Krauss, Emmylou Harris, Lee Ann Womack, Rhonda Vincent. ... I called Loretta Lynn because she fell and broke her shoulder, and she's been in the hospital. We kidded and laughed about it. She said she was doing fine and it was going to take 10 months for her to get better. I called her to say, 'How you doing?' and we talked for a hour. I do have those people that once we do connect, we feel like best friends. I love all the girls in the business and the guys too, but I can't call them because their girlfriends get jealous (laughs).
TMP: How long do you think you can keep up your career at your pace?
Parton: Forever, I hope. I hope to die right in the middle of a song and right on the stage doing what I love to do. I hope to be about 120 when that happens.
- [S106] The Mountain Press, 18 Dec 2006.
Parton role model for community
Entertainer's giving spirit good example for others to follow
Charity begins at home, and perhaps no one has exemplified that better than Sevier County's own Dolly Parton.
Parton has never forgotten where she came from and has been sharing her good fortune with others ever since, especially with those in her hometown. She continued her charitable efforts this week by providing a half million dollars for the construction of the county's new proposed hospital and announced a May 20 benefit concert to further aid the project.
Parton made the contribution to the Robert F. Thomas Foundation during a celebration of the hospital's approval of Certificates of Need to construct the $78.6 million medical center and a new $10 million cancer center.
Dr. Thomas delivered Parton back in 1946.
"Daddy paid him with a sack of cornmeal," she said, with a laugh. "And I've always joked that I've been raking in the dough ever since."
Parton is honorary chairman of the Doctor Robert F. Thomas Foundation, which is working to raise $10 million for the 202,125-square-foot, 79-bed facility on the former Dan River site, across Middle Creek Road from the current FSSMC site.
The new facility will have private patient rooms and is scheduled for completion in April 2009. It will include an improved and larger emergency room, as well as the addition of several new departments, including a well-baby nursery, sleep lab, chest pain center and four new surgical suites.
The center will be a marked improvement to the current facility which was built in 1965 to accommodate 17,000 visitors per year, but now handles 40,000 a year in a county whose population has tripled since the center first opened its doors.
That the new facilities are needed is irrefutable. That everyone can help in some way is just as hard to argue.
Of course, not everyone is able to give as much as Sevier County's favorite daughter, but every little bit can help and is appreciated.
- [S4] Knoxville News-Sentinel (Tennessee), 24 Dec 2006.
Night with A-list leaves Dolly stargazing
Jaw-dropping: Country personality on list of her own but still awed by big names at tribute show
By TERRY MORROW, morrow2@knews.com
December 24, 2006
WASHINGTON - The moment was pure Dolly Parton, except in her head.
There she was, sitting in the balcony of the Kennedy Center, while down below on stage a tribute to her work unfolded. Yet all Parton could think about were the people next to her.
"I thought I was kind of in a dream," she told the News Sentinel in an exclusive interview.
" You think, 'Oh, my gosh! I'm standing next to Steven Spielberg!' "
Yes, even Parton, at age 60 and with more than 40 years of show business under her rhinestone belt, can get star-struck occasionally.
And if she ever picked a proper moment to get that way, it was Dec. 3, when she, Spielberg, Broadway composer Andrew Lloyd Webber, conductor Zubin Mehta and Motown legend Smokey Robinson were saluted with prestigious Kennedy Center Honors.
The honor is one of the highest artistic merits in the United States. Parton received hers for her body of work and her contribution to American culture.
The day included a trip to the White House, where President Bush presented the honorees with his own words of praise. Later, at a gala that will be televised 9 p.m. Tuesday on WVLT, Channel 8, Parton and the others watched tributes on their behalf at the Kennedy Center.
Except for Robinson, with whom Parton had performed before, Parton had never met the other recipients. She was certainly familiar with their work, though.
"You get to know them as people, and all of a sudden you forget this body of work they've had," Parton said of her fellow honorees.
Parton's portion of the evening included Reese Witherspoon's testimony to Parton as a pioneer and friend; Kenny Rogers and Carrie Underwood covering "Islands in the Stream"; and Jessica Simpson, a self-proclaimed Parton fan, warbling "9 to 5."
If there is a pecking order in the world of celebrities, Parton surely must be near the top.
Witherspoon could attest to that. When the Oscar-winner was 9 years old, she re-enacted a scene from "9 to 5" for a school play, playing the Parton role. She also used to stay up on Sunday nights just to watch Parton's short-lived variety show for ABC.
Never did she imagine she'd not only meet Parton someday but would become one of her close friends. They met after friends arranged for Parton to drop by Witherspoon's birthday party last year.
"I get a lot of really good advice from her," Witherspoon told the News Sentinel. "I really look up to her. We have a lot of similar values. She has done so much right and done it with dignity."
On the other hand, Rogers says Parton's candor is her trademark.
"Dolly is one of those people with no filter," he said. "If it comes through her mind, it comes out her mouth. That's what makes her so totally unique. Every time I see her, there's just a wonderful spark that happens."
That candor has often driven her work. From the simplicity of "Coat of Many Colors" to the insecurity within the lyrics of "Jolene," Parton has been noted for what she reveals in her songs.
"I Will Always Love You," perhaps her most endearing tune, was inspired after she parted ways with singer Porter Wagoner, the Nashville entertainer who gave her the first taste of the spotlight.
Born to a family of 12 children in the hollows of Sevier County, Parton was always a musical child with dreams of stardom. The children often slept three or more to a bed. They had no modern conveniences. Her father was a sharecropper, and her mother tended to the brood.
Church was always the center of their lives.
Hardship didn't break Parton. It created her.
"I know what it means to be hungry. I know what it is like to be a person in need," Parton said in a 2004 News Sentinel interview. "My dreams were worth starving to death for. They were worth dying for. I've died a million times for them, especially in the early days. You have to be willing to sacrifice in order to see your dreams come true and then to help other people."
Despite the picture of alienation that "Coat" paints, Parton was a fairly well-liked student. It's hard to believe now that as a teenager she auditioned to be a cheerleader at Sevier County High School but failed to make the team.
She was the first in her family to graduate high school. On a career night for her high school senior class, she told the audience she wanted to be a country star. They laughed.
The day after she graduated, the 18-year-old Parton hopped a bus and went to Nashville to pursue her ambitions.
She always looks back but doesn't dwell on the past. She's returned dozens of times to her hometown, raising money for the local hospital and education.
Dollywood, now in its 21st season, is among the state's leading tourist attractions.
With all this to her credit, Parton's approach to celebrity is more about how she sees herself.
"I feel more like a working girl than a star," Parton said the night of the Kennedy Center awards.
"I don't know if I feel like a star. I just feel very humble. I feel like I did what I started out to do in my life. When I get out and meet people like this and they say I've done that, then I guess I have."
Terry Morrow's blog is http://blogs.knoxnews.com/knx/telebuddy/. He reviews for "Style" on Fridays on WBIR, Channel 10, and "The Marc & Kim Show" weekday mornings, WWST-FM, Star-102.1. He may be reached at 865-342-6445 and Morrow2@knews.com.
- [S4] Knoxville News-Sentinel (Tennessee), 18 May 2007.
Performing at home has Dolly Parton a little nervous
By TERRY MORROW, morrow2@knews.com
May 18, 2007
When Dolly Parton steps onstage Sunday night to raise money for a new medical center in her native Sevier County, she'll be a bit nervous.
It's not like she hasn't performed for the home crowd before. She's done dozens of shows over the years, mainly to raise money for educational projects in her native area.
But no matter what the cause, she says playing for the home folks is a different experience altogether.
"When you perform for friends and family, you are a lot more nervous than when you just do a concert," Parton wrote in an e-mail interview with the News Sentinel. "Naturally you always want to do great, but it's just more important what (the locals) think of you."
Parton's show at Smokies Park on Sunday is a major push to raise money for a new Fort Sanders Sevier Medical Center facility. The center will be built on 74 acres at the site of the former Cherokee Textile plant, across the street from the current hospital.
The entire building project - including a cancer center - is estimated to cost $100 million and be complete by fall 2009, said Amanda Brabson, spokeswoman for the hospital.
Brabson said the concert probably will raise around $500,000. The heftier tickets - going for $150 and $75 - were gone, but some $33 tickets were still available.
Parton made a commitment in late 2006 to help the project. Dollywood, her Pigeon Forge theme park, and Dixie Stampede, a Pigeon Forge attraction with which she is affiliated, have donated $500,000.
Parton's die-hard fans are coming from across the country to see her performance. Brabson said her office has been fielding calls from fans who are curious to find out what kind of public appearances Parton will be making Sunday and Monday, when she is in town.
"Dolly's fans are a hoot," Brabson said.
Though Parton was mum on details of the show, Brabson said it will be "90 minutes of Dolly," refuting rumors that the renowned entertainer would bring some of her Hollywood buddies along for added star power.
This is the first time in more than a decade that Parton has performed to benefit the Dr. Robert F. Thomas Foundation, the fundraising group for Sevier Medical Center.
The group is named for the late horseback-riding physician and minister who delivered dozens of babies around Sevier County, including Parton. It's hard to imagine now with her flash and glossy style, but Parton's first moments in this world were humble.
Ava Lee Parton gave birth to her daughter, Dolly Rebecca, at home, as was customary 60 and 70 years ago in the backwoods of Sevier County. Thomas arrived at the Partons' modest home riding a horse.
Undoubtedly, the doctor had no idea the baby would one day grow up to honor his name. Parton was named the foundation's honorary chairperson in 1990.
"Dr. Thomas was an unselfish and caring man," Parton wrote when asked about her impressions of him.
"He never worried about getting paid. He just took care of everyone."
For a young Parton, Thomas was one of the most educated men she had ever met, and his ability to help make sick people feel better was almost "magical" for her.
"He was sort of a hero because he could make them feel better," she wrote. "It was like he had magical powers. I wonder when he spanked my butt if he could tell I was going to be a singer."
Parton wrote that her involvement in the fundraising is not as much about community service as it is "loving and caring" about where she came from.
"I've had a lot of my folks in Sevier County hospital," she wrote.
"Just knowing that I can help get a better (medical center built), not only to take care of the sick, but to help prevent sickness, seems like a noble thing to get involved with."
- [S106] The Mountain Press, 18 Feb 2009.
KNOXVILLE - Dolly Parton will be honored by the University of Tennessee with only the second honorary degree ever granted by the campus.
Parton, a Sevierville native whose musical career has spanned more than five decades and 3,000 original musical compositions, will receive an honorary doctorate pending approval by the UT Board of Trustees at its meeting in Memphis on Feb. 26.
"Because of her career not just as a musician and entertainer, but for her role as a cultural ambassador, philanthropist and lifelong advocate for education, it is fitting that Dolly be honored with an honorary degree from the flagship educational institution of her home state," said Knoxville Chancellor Jimmy Cheek.
"It is an incredible honor for me to receive this degree from a prestigious university like UT. I've been a volunteer all my life and entertained folks around the world with "Rocky Top,'" Parton joked. "Seriously, education and the arts are very important to me, and this degree is something that makes me and would have made my parents very proud."
Parton's philanthropic work has centered on the importance of reading and education in the lives of children. In 1996, she founded the Imagination Library program in Sevier County, which provides children with a new age-appropriate book every month from birth to 5 years of age.
That program now has grown to serve 1,000 communities in 47 states, the United Kingdom and Canada, including all 95 counties in Tennessee through a partnership with the Governor's Books from Birth Foundation. By mid-2009, the Dollywood Foundation will have distributed more than 20 million books.
For more than 30 years, she also has provided incentives for graduation and college scholarships for Sevier County students, giving them opportunities beyond high school and a chance for a college education.
Parton often has provided funds to local schools to support operating expenses at times when budgets were tight. In addition to her many contributions to education, she also donated $1 million through a concert and her Dollywood and Dixie Stampede companies to construct the hospital and a women's health center in Sevier County.
The formal degree of a doctorate of humane and musical letters would be awarded during spring commencement on May 8.
The only other recipient of an honorary degree from UT Knoxville was former U.S. Sen. Howard H. Baker Jr.
Parton's other achievements include winning the Woodrow Wilson Award for Public Service from the Smithsonian Institution, the Kennedy Center Honors, the National Medal of Arts, the Living Legend award from the Library of Congress, membership in the Country Music Hall of Fame, the Songwriters Hall of Fame and the Grand Ole Opry, along with seven Grammy Awards, 10 Country Music Association Awards and two Oscar nominations.
- [S27] The Daily Times, http://www.thedailytimes.com/, (Blount County, Tennessee), 9 May 2009.
Just call her 'Dr. Dolly:' Parton receives Ph.D. from UT
By Duncan Mansfield
The Associated Press
KNOXVILLE - Award-winning entertainer, businesswoman and education advocate Dolly Parton has a new title.
"Just think, I am Dr. Dolly!" she said Friday after receiving an honorary doctorate of humane and musical letters from the University of Tennessee in Knoxville.
Always joking about her buxom figure, she added, "So when people say something about 'Double-D,' they will be thinking of something entirely different."
The audience of 1,069 new graduates from the College of Arts and Sciences roared with laughter and gave Parton, dressed in a form-fitting academic gown, another standing ovation.
She greeted them with a rousing rendition of the university's theme song, "Rocky Top," and gave a commencement speech encouraging them to work hard and follow their dreams.
Gov. Phil Bredesen said Parton, the fourth of 12 children from a poor Appalachian family in nearby Sevier County, "is all about dreaming big and about seeing those dreams become reality."
The first in her family to graduate from high school, Parton found success in Nashville, then Hollywood and most recently Broadway.
"I was just an average student," Parton told the graduates. "And if I had one regret, it is that I didn't further my education. Either that, or that I didn't really kiss Elvis."
Turning serious, she said, "I did further my education just like you, except you earned your degree in a few short years and it has taken me 45 years after high school to get mine. But nonetheless I am very, very proud."
Of her many accomplishments, her philanthropic work with children received the most attention Friday. Those efforts began years ago with her offer of $500 to Sevier County students who graduated from high school, sharply reducing her home county's dropout rate.
In 1996, Parton founded the Imagination Library, which sends a book each month to children from birth to the start of their schooling. The program began with children in Sevier County. Today, it serves 1,000 communities in 47 states, the United Kingdom and Canada. Some 500,000 students now receive these books.
Parton, who capped her remarks to the new graduates by singing her song "Try," sent them away with her best wishes.
"To all of you heading out into the big world, from me and from your parents and all the folks that love you, I would just like to say that I hope life treats you kind, and I hope you have all of your dreams come true.
"I wish you joy and happiness. But above all else, I wish you love. And I will always love you."
This was only the second honorary degree ever bestowed by the university's flagship campus. In 2005, the university gave a similar honor to former Sen. Howard Baker Jr.
- [S106] The Mountain Press, 16 May 2011.
Upland Chronicles: Dolly Parton: Sevier’s hometown celebrity
Few people are known by their first name across the globe. Sevier County can be proud to have one such person who claims this community as home.
Dolly Rebecca Parton was born on Jan. 19, 1946, in Locust Ridge, a small community outside of Sevierville. She was the fourth of 12 children born to her parents, Avie Lee Parton and Robert Lee Parton.
Performing at a very young age, Dolly made numerous appearances on The Cas Walker Show. Those appearances would eventually lead Dolly to make one of the biggest decisions in her life: leaving Sevier County to pursue a music career in Nashville.
In 1964, following the day of her graduation from Sevier County High School, Dolly journeyed from Sevierville to Nashville. Ignoring naysayers, Dolly exemplified the spirit of a professional performer by leaving everything she had known.
Once she had made it to Nashville, it was only a matter of time until Dolly found success. On her first day in Nashville, while at a Wishy-Washy Laundromat, the aspiring country singer met Nashville native Carl Thomas Dean. In two short years, the couple wed on May 30, 1966, in Ringgold, Ga.
With her personal life blossoming, Dolly continued songwriting. In 1965, she signed a recording contract withMonument Records. Though she was a signed musician, her first true success came in 1967 when she was approached by Porter Wagoner to replace Norma Jean on “The Porter Wagoner Show.” Initially, crowds voiced their desire to see Norma Jean; however, the crowds eventually accepted Dolly.
Wagner believed Dolly was a great talent. He persuaded RCA Victor, his label, to sign her to a contract. The label was cautious and felt the best way to guarantee Dolly’s success with them would be to have her and Wagner to record a duet together for heralbum. In late 1967, their duet “The Last Thing on My Mind” was issued as her first single on the RCA Victor label. The song became Dolly’s first top 10 hit in 1968 beginning a streak of consecutive top 10 hits lasting six years.Though her solo success took time, Dolly continued working with Porter Wagoner as he was her co-producer and held a large stake in her publishing company.
In 1971, Dolly had her first solo No. 1 single “Joshua.” As it turns out, 1971 would become the year the world began to realize the true talents of Dolly as she released the song that defined her Smoky Mountain Childhood, “Coat of Many Colors.” The song told the true story of a coat her mother had made her out of various colors.
Throughout her life Dolly has carried this song with her as a reminder of how a family can be without financial riches but can still be rich in love.
Dolly’s most successful songs were still to come. In 1973, Dolly released “Jolene,” which served as the first of many No. 1 hits and chart-topping blockbusters.
Dolly’s music career also showcases how brilliant she is as a business woman. One of the most interesting stories in regards to Dolly’s success revolves around her follow-up single, “I Will Always Love You.” In numerous interviews, she accredits the song as being a tribute to her former business partner, Wagoner (the two were ending their business together during this period in 1974; however, Wagoner continued to produce her albums until 1976).
An interesting story regarding this song involves Elvis Presley’s desire to record the song. Originally intrigued by the proposition, Dolly was tasked with an important decision as Elvis’ manager, Tom Parker, informed Dolly she would be required to sign over half of all publishing rights. Unhappy with the revelation, Dolly declined and Elvis never recorded the song.
By knowing when not to compromise as an artist or business woman, she earned the nickname The Iron Butterfly. Knowing when not to compromise has led to a great deal of success for Dolly. Another interesting fact about the song is that Dolly rerecorded the track and rereleased it in 1982 as part of the soundtrack for her film, “The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas.” The track was rereleased as a single and became a No. 1 hit again, which marks Dolly as the first musician to ever achieve this feat. “I Will Always Love You” has garnered millions in royalties through licensing by other musicians, most notably Whitney Houston’s cover of the song in 1992.
Though Dolly’s success first came in music, she had a great deal of success in films. Her first foray into film was “Nine to Five” (1980) and her second film was “The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas” (1982). She was nominated for numerous awards for her roles in both films.
Since then, Dolly has appeared in many other successful films and is co-owner of film studio, Sandollar Productions, which has produced numerous movies including “Father of the Bride,” “Father of the Bride Part 2” and “Straight Talk,” among others. Dolly is also part owner of Pigeon Forge’s Dollywood, Dollywood Splash Country and Dixie Stampede. The attractions bearing her name in Pigeon Forge have provided thousands of jobs for the people of Sevier County.
Though Dolly acclaimed worldwide fame through her decades of performing and recording of over 70 albums, writing more than 3,000 songs and after selling more than 100 million albums, Dolly has never forgotten her Sevier County roots.
Nothing details this more than her continuous generosity throughout her hometown community. A few of Dolly’s projects include her work with the Dr. Robert F. Thomas Foundation (as he was the doctor who delivered her), the LeConte Medical Center, and her Imagination Library.
The most well known of her various philanthropic efforts would be the Imagination Library, which was established in 1996 as part of the Dollywood Foundation. The Imagination Library originated in Sevier County to provide free books for children up to age 5. Now the program has spread out across 41 states as well as Canada and the United Kingdom.
Though Dolly is celebrated entertainer and business woman, she has never allowed her fame to keep her away from her native hometown. Her love of Sevier County, and all she has done for its people, has not been forgotten.
Friday marked the 26th annual Dolly’s Homecoming Parade. The parade serves as a way for the City of Pigeon Forge and the local community to come out in full force to welcome Dolly back to Sevier County.
Sevierville also recognizes Dolly through The Mountain Soul Vocal Competition, which is part of the Bloomin’ Barbeque & Bluegrass festival, held each May in downtown Sevierville. The primary focus of the competition is to honor the songwriting of Dolly Parton through each performer’s own vocal interpretation.
Dolly was also honored in 2009 as she was named by the Great Smoky Mountains National Park as its ambassador during its 75th anniversary. Another honor bestowed on Dolly is the statue of her on the Sevier County Courthouse lawn. Jim Gray, a local artist, sculpted the statue, which was unveiled by Dolly on May 2, 1987. The statue presents Dolly as a young, barefoot woman sitting on a rock playing her guitar. Over the years, it has served as a must-see monument to Dolly’s legion of fans who visit Sevier County.
Known the world over for her career in entertainment, Sevier County natives know Dolly as a local girl whose philanthropy has gone unmatched. Her shining successes serve as a testament to herexperiences in her hometown area. The relationship between Dolly and the people of Sevier County is easily summarized in that both admire and love each other.
If anything, Dolly is living proof you can always return home again.
— Brandon Barnes is special events coordinator of Pigeon Forge Department of Tourism. The Upland Chronicles series celebrates the heritage and past of Sevier County. If you have suggestions for future topics, would like to submit a column or have comments; contact Carroll McMahan at 453-6411 or e-mail to cmcmahan@scoc.org; or Ron Rader at 604-9161 or email to ron@ronraderproperiies.com.
- [S106] The Mountain Press, 17 Jan 2016.
As Dolly Parton turns 70, she's as busy as ever
KENNETH BURNS
Dolly Parton is everywhere.
“Dolly Parton’s Coat of Many Colors,” the television movie based on her childhood, was the highest-rated broadcast TV movie in years when it was shown in December. It aired as part of Parton’s multi-film development deal with NBC.
Pick up a copy of the 2016 Official Tennessee Vacation Guide, a publication of the Tennessee Department of Tourist Development. Parton’s on the cover.
Dollywood, Parton’s namesake Sevier County entertainment complex, continues to see remarkable growth. A critical new component, Dollywood’s DreamMore Resort, got massive attention when it opened last year.
Her 2014 album “Blue Smoke” was a top-10 hit. While touring to promote it, she went viral with video of her performing “Yakety Sax” to as many as 200,000 people at England’s Glastonbury Festival.
Through it all, the star of music, film, television, theme parks and philanthropy maintains close ties to Sevier County. She appears here regularly, whether she’s announcing the latest Dollywood expansion or waving to fans in her annual parade.
“Growing up in the Smokies and Sevier County was a blessing,” she wrote in response to emailed questions from The Mountain Press. “It is natural to have ties to where you were born and raised. In my case, I have most of my family still there, and the beauty of the Smokies makes it like heaven on earth.”
It’s a lot of activity for a singer/songwriter/businesswoman/beloved international icon of any age.
Parton turns 70 on Tuesday.
She was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame and Museum in 1999, along with Conway Twitty and Johnny Bond.
“What she’s done since her Hall of Fame entrance is nothing short of extraordinary,” said Hall of Fame Museum Editor Peter Cooper. “For someone to be turning 70 in the prime of her career, that’s highly unusual. What Johnny Cash had was a late-career resurgence of popularity and acclaim. It’s impossible for Dolly to have a resurgence, because there was never a retreat.”
Details of her early life in Sevier County are well known, because she has described them so vividly in her work. One of her best-known songs, “Coat of Many Colors,” tells an aching tale of Appalachian poverty.
“Most of my childhood was happy, but I remember the hard and sad times,” Parton noted. “I think that is why I can relate to poor people.”
“Because of her total, blunt honesty, she’s been so upfront about her upbringing,” said Sevier County Historian Carroll McMahan, who contributes the Upland Chronicles history column to The Mountain Press.
McMahan was a freshman at Sevier County High School when Parton was in the senior class of 1964.
“She was the same Dolly she is today,” McMahan said. “She dressed in the same manner. She was very flamboyant.”
Parton’s determination and work ethic were obvious even in high school, McMahan said. Even so, “She had her detractors. People made fun of her. She was not taken seriously by everyone. But if it bothered her, she never let it show. She never held a grudge.”
To her high school peers, Parton’s success as a singer was “a foregone conclusion,” McMahan said. “But the fact that she would be a household name throughout the world was hard to imagine.”
The early days of Parton’s career are almost the stuff of mythology, and they are a familiar Nashville story. In her 1994 memoir “Dolly: My Life and Other Unfinished Business,” she describes moving to Music City immediately after graduating from high school:
“I boarded a Greyhound bus with my dreams, my old guitar, the songs I had written, and the rest of my belongings in a set of matching luggage – three paper bags from the same grocery store.”
“She just came in with boundless optimism and boundless talent,” said Nashville author, columnist and longtime music industry observer Robert K. Oermann. “The business, when she came into it, was a small thing. It was a little niche in American culture. It was like a little craft operation. Today it’s a huge industry, and I don’t think you could just come in as she did, with raw talent, and succeed that brilliantly.”
In the 1960s and 1970s, Parton came to national prominence singing on “The Porter Wagoner Show.” She saw increasing success as a solo artist in the 1970s, with hit singles including “Love Is Like a Butterfly,” “I Will Always Love You” and the crossover smash “Here You Come Again.”
Unlike many Nashville artists, she found fame writing her own material.
“One of the reasons I moved to Nashville was the songwriting of Tom T. Hall, Kris Kristofferson and Dolly Parton,” Oermann recalled. “I listened to those songs, and I said, ‘If that’s country music, I need to go there.’”
Parton dabbled in disco and pop and, in the 1980s, launched a movie career with a starring role in the popular comedy “9 to 5.” Film critic Roger Ebert wrote of her debut: “She is, on the basis of this one film, a natural-born movie star, a performer who holds our attention so easily that it’s hard to believe it’s her first film.”
In 1986, Parton affirmed her commitment to Sevier County when, in partnership with the company now called Herschend Family Entertainment, she opened the Dollywood theme park in Pigeon Forge.
After numerous expansions, including the resort and the water park Dollywood’s Splash Country, the award-winning complex is an essential component of the county’s tourism economy.
The opening of Dollywood “was one of the turning points in tourism in Sevier County,” McMahan said. “I’ve always said that the first big turning point was the establishment of the national park, and the second big turning point was the establishment of Dollywood.”
More than most country artists, Parton has broad appeal. Her admirers include both urban hipsters and traditional country fans. Oermann put it succinctly: “Who doesn’t love Dolly Parton?”
“People have been able to access Dolly in different ways, and that is part of the reason for her appeal,” Cooper said. “Some people access her through records like ‘Coat of Many Colors.’ Some through covers of her songs, like Whitney Houston’s cover of ‘I Will Always Love You,’ which became one of the biggest singles of all time. Some through her movies.”
The basis of Parton’s appeal is “her purity of expression,” Cooper said. “Over and over, she wrote her story until it became part of our story. ‘Coat of Many Colors’ could not have come from any other person and could not have come from any other place. That’s not something you conjure up in a cowriting session.”
Parton has “expanded the reach of country music,” Cooper said. “That’s one reason she’s in the Hall of Fame. She’s written some of the most important and beloved songs in country music history. She’s been an ambassador for this genre of music, and for the state of Tennessee, and East Tennessee. This is somebody that’s really changed things. The world is different because there’s a Dolly Parton in it.”
kburns@themountainpress.com
- [S106] The Mountain Press, 21 Feb 2016.
Upland Chronicles: Dolly Parton statue has become iconic symbol
CARROLL MCMAHAN
“I’m a hometown girl and my hometown is Sevierville, Tennessee,” says Dolly Parton. “I’ve had the good fortune of getting to travel all over this world and I’ve had all kinds of wonderful awards, but I think probably one of the greatest things that ever happened to me in my whole career, in my whole life really, is the statue of me in the courthouse yard in Sevierville.”
In 1985, a group of Sevier County citizens entertained the idea of honoring Parton with a public sculpture. After preliminary discussions, they approached artist Jim Gray to see if he would be interested in taking on such a commission.
Gray, long known in the art world for his watercolor and oil paintings highlighting the landscape and people of East Tennessee, and his seascapes, accepted the challenge, and Parton gave her permission enthusiastically. However, she was adamant that the funds were to come from the private sector.
A steering committee was formed and Dian Robertson was selected to serve as chairman. The other committee members were Sidney Wade, Geraldine Smelcer, Brenda Daugherty, Ann Kelch, Steve Lane, Debbie Smith and Dwight Ogle. The steering committee appointed a fundraising committee that included R.B. Summitt, Pat Head Summitt, Geneva Waters, Ruby Fox, Liz King, Jane Rader, Jack Wicker, John Leeper, Janice Russell, Freda O’Dell, Shirley Matthews, Barbara Blacker, Glenda Johnson and Judy Wilson.
Fundraising activities included a Dolly look-alike beauty pageant, an arts and crafts auction, a benefit play and an alumni vs. varsity basketball game. However, most of the money came from funds solicited from business clubs and corporate and individual donations.
Gray’s son Chris suggested that his father depict Parton sitting on a rock, such as a rock in a Smoky Mountain stream.
Gray completed a small clay model of what he hoped would be the finished product. After preliminary sketches and the early clay model, his next step was to locate a suitable rock to be the base for his bronze. He found what he was looking for in a big rock pile near Blalock’s in Sevierville.
The finished statue is six and a half feet tall, plus the base. After positioning the rock, Gray did a plaster cast of the top, so the statue would fit properly. Once the skeleton was made of steel, he used about 300 pounds of clay. The work was done in Gray’s South Knoxville studio, then moved to Wagner Foundry in Fredericksburg, Virginia, where the bronze was actually poured.
On Sunday, May 3, 1987, Dolly Parton came back to her hometown to attend two ceremonies. At 2:30 p.m. she unveiled the new cornerstone for the partially completed Dolly Parton Wellness and Rehabilitation Center at Sevier County Medical Center.
Then, at 4 p.m., Gray’s impressive statue was unveiled on the lawn of the Sevier County Courthouse. An estimated 500 people crowded closed-off Court Avenue in front of the courthouse for the ceremony. Some arrived as early as 1 p.m. to ensure a good vantage point.
In opening remarks, Sevier County Executive Larry Waters said he was “glad they placed the statue where they did, because it improves the view from my office. Now I’ve got an incentive to come to work in the mornings.”
Waters also told the crowd that President Ronald Reagan called the county offices on Friday, stating he was sorry that he could not attend the ceremonies.
Sevierville Mayor Gary Wade told the crowd why the decision was made to place the statue at the courthouse. “Dolly Parton is one of us,” said Wade, “and to every little girl and boy in Sevier County she has been an inspiration, and proof-positive that you can make it if you try.”
“For this reason she has become a historical figure, worthy of permanent recognition,” the mayor said.
Jim Gray also spoke, saying he had received more offers for help on this project than any he had ever undertaken. “Everyone wanted to help...carry clay, or anything,” Gray said with a chuckle. “But I wanted to do this one by myself.” Gray said more than 2,000 hours went into the project.
Parton’s remarks were brief, with her acknowledging the attendance of her father, Lee, and several other members of her family as well as legendary Knoxville grocer Cas Walker. “Cas, you told ’em I’d be a star.” Parton said. “And I couldn’t let you down.”
Parton joked about the possibility of her statue falling prey to courthouse traditions. “Now I don’t want any of you men down here on Saturday afternoon spitting tobacco juice on my legs,” she said. “But no matter what it looks like, maybe it’ll keep the pigeons off the roof.”
The star then turned a bit sentimental, saying, “It makes me feel like you folks are proud of me, and I’ve always wanted you to be.”
Following her remarks, Parton made her way to the courthouse lawn to remove the butterfly-adorned cover. The crowd roared its approval when the statue was unveiled.
In the ensuing years, millions of visitors from all over the world have made the pilgrimage to the courthouse to see the famous statue of Dolly Parton. The statue was awarded a 2015 Certificate of Excellence from TripAdvisor. The award is based on the quality of reviews and opinions earned on TripAdvisor in the past year.
Dolly Parton is the most honored female country performer of all time. During her Hall of Fame career, sales of her recordings have reportedly topped a staggering 100 million worldwide. She has won seven Grammy Awards, eight CMA Awards and three American Music Awards, and is only one of five female artists to win the Country Music Association’s Entertainer of the Year Award.
In 2006, she was honored by the Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts for her lifetime contributions to the arts. Yet with all the national and international recognition given her, Dolly Parton calls the statue her “greatest honor, because it came from the people who know me.”
Carroll McMahan is special projects facilitator for the Sevierville Chamber of Commerce and serves as Sevier County historian.
The Upland Chronicles series celebrates the heritage and past of Sevier County. If you have suggestions for future topics, would like to submit a column or have comments, contact Carroll McMahan at 453-6411 or cmcmahan@scoc.org; or Ron Rader at 604-9161 or ron@ronraderproperties.com.
- [S91] Smoky Mountain Memories, Willadeene Parton, (1996), xxii.
- [S129] The Official Marriage Records of Sevier County Tennessee 1914-1944, Volume II, Smoky Mountain Historical Society, (Copyright 2008), ISBN 1-890150-00-4.
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