Dolly Parton’s life story is a remarkable testament to perseverance. Raised in extreme poverty, she often lacked basic necessities. Dolly was the fourth among 12 siblings, with one brother passing away in infancy. Her parents, Avie Lee, who managed the household, and Robert Lee Parton, a sharecropper who became a tobacco farmer, brought up their large family in Locust Ridge, nestled within Tennessee’s Great Smoky Mountains. The family resided in a modest two-room cabin, devoid of electricity or running water.

Dolly Parton’s transformation since childhood is an extraordinary journey of resilience. She grew up, as she puts it, “dirt poor,” in conditions so precarious that she was often deprived of the basics. Dolly was the fourth of 12 children, one of whom died in infancy, born to homemaker Avie Lee and sharecropper-turned-tobacco farmer Robert Lee Parton. Raised in Locust Ridge in the Great Smoky Mountains of East Tennessee, Dolly and her family lived in a two-room cabin with no running water or electricity. 

Dolly openly discusses her challenging upbringing, taking pride in her family’s ingenuity and the invaluable lessons she gained. “We didn’t have any money, but we were rich in things that money don’t buy. You know, like love and kindness and understanding,” she shared with Today in 2015. Her father’s tireless work instilled a strong work ethic in her, while her mother inspired her to dream and sing. Although her early years were undeniably difficult, they shaped her character and set the stage for her future success.

At just 9 years old, Dolly faced the loss of her infant brother, Larry Parton, who passed away at only four days old in July 1955. Despite their short time together, Dolly felt a deep sense of responsibility, as she was tasked with caring for him more than her other siblings. Avie Lee, managing a household of 12, assigned each older child to look after a younger sibling. “My mother used to say, ‘This one is gonna be your baby,” Dolly recalled during a 2015 press event for “Coat of Many Colors,” a TV film inspired by her life (via Fox News).

Dolly Parton was just 9 years old when her baby brother, Larry Parton, died in July 1955. He was four days old. Even though she barely had any time with Larry, she felt responsible for him since she was supposed to care for him more than the other siblings. A mother of 12, Avie Lee enlisted her older children to help. “[My mother] used to say, ‘This one is gonna be your baby,” Dolly said at a 2015 press conference to discuss “Coat of Many Colors,” a made-for-TV film inspired by her life (via Fox News).

That meant each sibling was expected to pay special attention to their assigned baby’s needs while their mother tended to everything else. “You have got to get up with it at night and rock it back and forth. This particular baby that passed away in the movie was my baby,” she explained. When Larry died, it weighed heavily on young Dolly’s shoulders. “There is a lot of heartache and stuff that goes on with that,” she said.

Dolly’s attachment to Larry began during her mother’s pregnancy, when she told her the new baby was going to be hers. “I’d sing to it and kiss on the belly and, you know, couldn’t wait for my baby to come,” she said on Bunnie Xo’s “Dumb Blonde” podcast in 2024. She could not understand that his death had nothing to do with her. “It just crushed me … I had a guilt thing about it, somehow,” she said.

Dolly Parton’s father started working as a young boy to help provide for his family. That was the reality of his upbringing in rural Tennessee. “Kids had to go to the fields and work to help support all of these big families,” she told CNN in 2016. But Robert Lee Parton’s contributions came at a great cost. “My own father didn’t get a chance to go to school. He couldn’t read and write,” she added. Being illiterate closed many doors for him. “That hindered him a great deal because he was so smart. It really bothered him a lot,” she shared. 

Dolly can only imagine the great things her father could’ve achieved had he had the opportunity to get an education. Her father’s experience shaped her in many ways, teaching her to appreciate intelligence in people from all walks of life, while striving to close the gap for the underprivileged. In 1995, she launched Imagination Library, a project that mails out books to families with children under 5. This was her way of honoring her father’s journey.

“I thought, ‘Well, what can I do for my precious dad?’ ‘Cause he was the greatest daddy in the world and one of the smartest people I’d ever known,’” Dolly told People in 2018. The initiative touched him deeply. “Before he passed away, my Daddy told me the Imagination Library was probably the most important thing I had ever done,” she wrote on the Imagination Library website.

The business of being born in the ’40s came with a lot more risks than today. But some community doctors were determined to improve poor folks’ chances. Luckily for the Partons, they had one of those willing to reach their one-room cabin on the Little Pigeon River in East Tennessee by any means necessary. On January 19, 1946, Dr. Robert F. Thomas delivered Dolly Parton in exchange for cornmeal, the only payment Avie and Lee Parton could offer.

Having a doctor present wasn’t the plan. The Partons knew they couldn’t afford one. But when Avie experienced complications in the middle of a snowstorm, Lee went to get help on his horse. Thomas, who was also a Methodist missionary, didn’t think twice, even though the way was long and difficult. “I always make a joke that Dr. Thomas was paid for with a sack of cornmeal, and I’ve been raking in the dough ever since,” Dolly, whose net worth is a whopping $650 million, wrote in her 2020 book, “Songteller: My Life in Lyrics.”

In 1973, Dolly released a song in his honor. “There was no way to drive along / The roads back in those mountains / But Dr. Thomas got there / Just the same,” she penned. She also became honorary chairperson of the Dr. Robert F. Thomas Foundation, which works to improve healthcare access in her native Sevier County. “He brought me into the world, and I’ve tried to keep his memory alive,” she wrote in “Songteller.”

Dolly Parton and her family were grateful to be able to count on Dr. Robert F. Thomas, but they couldn’t always summon him. For most health issues, the Partons had to turn to their own resourcefulness. That’s what they did when Dolly suffered a health scare at around age 6 or 7. She seriously injured her foot after jumping over a fence and landing on a broken Mason jar. “[I] cut three of my toes, just my little toes on my right foot, almost off and they were just kind of hanging there,” she said on “The Dr. Oz Show” in 2017 (via People).

Avie and Lee Parton didn’t have enough money to take her to the hospital, so they took matters into their own hands. “My dad and my brothers, they had to hold me down,” she told Dr. Oz. First, her mother applied cornmeal to the wound to absorb the blood. Next, Avie poured kerosene to clean it and got her sewing kit out. “She literally had to sew my toes back on,” she explained.

Without her mother’s ingenuity and strength to act in a terrifying situation, Dolly would have likely lost her toes. “They healed and I’m still walking on them,” she said. But for non-emergencies, the Partons could still turn to their trusted community doctor. “He was the one who snipped your tonsils or did whatever. I still remember that antiseptic smell in his little clinic by the church,” she wrote in “Songteller: My Life in Lyrics.” 

Winters were always hard up in Dolly Parton’s corner of the Great Smoky Mountains, but a particularly harsh one nearly killed her and her family. The Partons knew a snowstorm was rolling in, so they took preventative measures by boarding up the windows in their cabin to keep the wind and cold out. However, they couldn’t have anticipated just how severe the storm would be. “We got trapped in there,” she told Entertainment Tonight in 2016.

Dolly and her siblings were terrified, knowing there was nothing they could do. “We thought we were going to die and our little tears were frozen on our little faces,” she said. “We were frozen, no fire, no food, no nothing.” Facing a lack of basic necessities, they turned to the abundance of their faith. “It had to have been prayer that melted the snow around us and got us out of there. That’s kind of like our Christmas miracle,” she concluded.

While that year could have been deadly, others were still difficult. Sharing a bed with two or three younger siblings in the dead of winter, Dolly often welcomed “accidents” in the middle of the night. “That was the only warm thing we knew in the winter time. That was almost a pleasure — to get peed on — because it was so cold. Lord. It was as cold in the room as it was outside,” she told Playboy in 1978 (via Rolling Stone).