PIONEER WOMAN: Here's the Real Reason Dolly Parton Never Had Children With Carl Dean
Dolly Parton's impressive vocals, over-the-top style, and unapologetic candor have made her one of the most recognizable figures in country music. But there's one part of the singer's vibrant life that she keeps out of the spotlight: Her relationship with Carl Thomas Dean.
Over the past five decades, the famous couple has only been seen in public together a handful of times. Still, their long-lasting marriage remains strong behind the scenes. Here's everything you need to know about Dolly and Carl's private romance, from how it got started to why they never had children.
How did Dolly and Carl meet?
The way their relationship began sounds like the opening lyrics of a country love song. Dolly, who was 18 at the time, had just moved to Nashville from Sevierville, Tennessee. She was standing outside of a laundromat in 1964 when Carl pulled up in his white pickup truck and the pair started chatting. Dolly was "surprised and delighted" when she felt an instant connection to her future husband.
"It’s not often that someone can say their life changed forever at a place called the Wishy Washy Washateria," she recently told 60 Minutes. "I'd just graduated from high school. Left two boyfriends at home, had no intentions of finding a boyfriend. I just wanted to work on my music. I didn’t want no boys, no men or anybody sidetracking me. So what do I do the very first day?"
Apparently, it was love at first sight for Carl, too.
"My first thought was I'm gonna marry that girl," he revealed when they renewed their vows in 2016. "My second thought was, 'Lord she's good lookin.' And that was the day my life began."
Despite Dolly's colorful personality, her relationship with Carl has been low-key since the beginning.
"When I met my husband, he wanted to take me out to dinner. He pulled up to the drive-in window and got our food at McDonald’s," she told People about their early courtship. "We know a few little places we can go without being bothered. He only likes to go places where he can be comfortable!"
When did they get married?
After two years of unorthodox dinner dates, Dolly and Carl made their relationship official. They got married on May 30, 1966 in a private ceremony in Ringgold, Georgia when she was 20 and he was 23.
They were forced to secretly wed because Dolly's record label, Monument, was afraid that a serious relationship would interfere with her music career. The only other people in attendance at the tiny Baptist church where they exchanged vows were Dolly's mother, Avie Lee, and the preacher and his wife.
"We'd already sent out invitations and so I thought, 'I ain’t waiting!'" Dolly said of their decision to elope. "I had a little white dress and little flowers, and my mom went with me."
Today, Dolly's wedding dress and Carl's suit are on display at the Chasing Rainbows Museum in Dollywood.
Dolly and Carl prove that opposites attract.
Soon after they got married, Dolly's country music career took off—and Carl wanted nothing to do with it.
When she was honored for one of her earliest award-winning songs, "Put It Off Until Tomorrow," Dolly brought her husband to the first (and last) industry event they ever attended together.
"Carl and I got dressed up, he was in a tux, and we drove to the dinner. We got out and walked up the red carpet and went inside and sat through dinner and the awards, and I went up and got my award," Dolly recalled. "After the dinner. . . Carl turned to me and said, 'Dolly, I want you to have everything you want, and I'm happy for you, but don't you ever ask me to go to another one of them dang things again!'"
Since then, Carl has remained in the background while Dolly dominates the spotlight—but he's still her number one fan.
"He's always supporting me as long as I don’t try to drag him in on it," she said at the premiere of her Netflix series, Dolly Parton’s Heartstrings. "He’s always been my biggest fan behind the scenes."
Although Dolly and Carl's personalities come across as an unlikely match, the country superstar has said that their differences are actually the secret to their long-lasting union.
"He wants to be mostly around the house. He knows I’m just the opposite. I can't go enough places. I can't do enough things. He loves that," Dolly told People in 2015. "He’s independent. He doesn’t need me in his face, and it’s the same with me. But when we’re together, we have enough things in common that it works."
But what about Jolene?
In 1973, Dolly released her hit song "Jolene" which was so popular, it later became the title of her fourteenth studio album. The lyrics of the catchy tune—which describe a beautiful, young red-haired woman name Jolene—immediately sparked rumors of infidelity in Dolly and Carl's marriage.
The singer herself did nothing to dispute these claims, even telling fans at concerts that she "put a stop" to Carl going to the bank where Jolene apparently worked. However, given Carl's private nature and Dolly's confidence in their relationship, a story of an affair seemed hard to believe.
In recent years, Dolly revealed an alternate inspiration for the famous song that's much less scandalous. According to The Independent, Jolene is actually a little girl who Dolly met at one of her shows and promised to write a song about, because Jolene had "just about the prettiest name" she'd ever heard.
There's no telling which story about Jolene is true—but after more than fifty years together, it doesn't seem to matter.
Why didn't Dolly and Carl have kids?
With such a strong marriage, people often wonder why Dolly and Carl never had children. The music icon says she "used to think" she should regret it—but now, she realizes that "God has a plan for everything."
"Early on, when my husband and I were dating, and then when we got married, we just assumed we would have kids. We weren't doing anything to stop it. In fact, we thought maybe we would," Dolly once told Billboard. "We even had names if we did, but it didn't turn out that way. Now I say, 'God didn't mean for me to have kids so everybody's kids could be mine.'"
According to an interview with Closer Weekly, Dolly suffered from endometriosis—a painful condition that can lead to infertility—and underwent a partial hysterectomy in 1984. While this may have prevented Dolly from starting a family, she has shown her love for kids over the years by donating more than one million books to children through her Imagination Library.
Now, at 74, the singer has no regrets about the way her life with Carl turned out.
"I'm very close to my family. . .and we're very close to our nieces and nephews," she explained. "Now that Carl and I are older, we often say, 'Aren't you glad we didn't have kids? Now we don't have kids to worry about.'"
So, what's their secret?
Dolly and Carl just celebrated their 54th wedding anniversary in May, and they said "if we had it to do all over, we'd do it all over again."
"We get along great and we’ve just had a really good marriage," Dolly told 60 Minutes. "He’s independent. So am I. He likes staying home. I like staying gone."
In fact, that's Dolly's biggest secret to a long-lasting relationship: "Stay gone!" 😂
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