Country music legend Dolly Parton has been married for over 50 years.
But even with a union this long-lasting, it's easy to overlook, as her husband, Carl Dean,
is notoriously private.
Here are some details you probably didn't know about their marriage.
Parton and Dean met back in 1964 in an unlikely fashion.
According to Parton's official website, the two first crossed paths outside the Wishy
Washy Laundromat on the very first day Parton moved to Nashville, Tennessee.
As Parton recalled,
"I was surprised and delighted that while he talked to me, he looked at my face (a rare
thing for me).
He seemed to be genuinely interested in finding out who I was and what I was about."
Dean made such a good impression that the two ended up getting married two years later.
Dean spoke about meeting Parton in a rare public statement in 2017, admitting,
"My first thought was, 'I'm gonna marry that girl.'
My second thought was, 'Lord she's good lookin'.'
And that was the day my life began.
I wouldn't trade the last 50 years for nothing on this earth."
Parton added,
"If I had it to do all over, I'd do it all over again."
Parton and Dean renewed their vows for their 50th anniversary in an intimate ceremony in
2016, but their first wedding ceremony was much more low-key and private.
In fact, it was totally secret.
In a 2016 interview with CMT News, Parton explained that her record label wanted her
to wait a year to get married.
Since they had invested so much money and time in building up her career, she felt she
owed it to them to honor their request.
But Dean's mother was so excited about the two getting married that they decided to do
it secretly.
So Parton, Dean, and Parton's mother traveled across the state to Ringgold, Georgia for
a small ceremony on May 30th, 1966.
Parton wore a little white dress and carried a little bouquet and a little Bible.
She didn't want to get married in a courthouse, so they found a Baptist church nearby and
had the ceremony there.
Their wedding vow renewal ceremony fifty years later on May 30th, 2016 was a chance for them
to redo their secret marriage.
As Parton revealed to Rolling Stone,
"I got all dressed up in the most beautiful gown you've ever seen and dressed that husband
of mine up.
He looked like a handsome dude out of Hollywood."
They kept the ceremony small with just a few family members and friends and exchanged vows
at a chapel near their home.
They also auctioned the wedding photos to benefit Parton's Imagination Library literacy
charity.
She told People Magazine that she was "shocked" that her husband agreed to something so uncharacteristically
public.
Being married for more than 50 years is a feat worth applauding for anyone.
"We have a little RV.
We travel around everywhere.
So after 50 years, which is saying a lot, in this business."
It's normal to wonder how Parton and Dean have been making things work for as long as
they have.
As it turns out, the country star has a bit of a strange secret to making it last: the
two of them spend plenty of time apart.
In a 2018 interview with People Magazine, Parton said that she always laughs when people
ask her the key to their love, adding,
"I always say 'Stay gone!' and there's a lot of truth to that.
I travel a lot, but we really enjoy each other when we're together and the little things
we do."
In a 2011 interview with Taste of Country, Parton shared that she and Dean are both very
independent people, so they don't need to be around each other all the time.
She also touched upon the importance of friendship in marriage, noting,
"You've gotta be great friends.
And you've gotta be able to be accepting and just kind of know that you're not gonna change
that person, because you married him because you loved 'em for what they were."
Parton has had many hit songs during her long career, but one that's really stood out among
the rest is "Jolene."
It tells the story of a beautiful red-headed woman trying to steal away Parton's man, and
it's not just packed with meaningless lyrics.
It's actually about a real situation that Parton and Dean went through.
During a 2014 concert in Glastonbury, Parton revealed to the crowd,
"Some of you may or may not know that that song was loosely based on a little bit of
truth.
I wrote that years ago when my husband was spending a little more time with Jolene than
I thought he should be."
The Jolene in the song is apparently based on a red-headed bank teller who had a crush
on Dean, who liked the attention, so he kept going back to her.
Parton started teasing him about it, and it became a joke between them.
So it's actually "an innocent song," according to Parton.
As for the title of the song, she got the name "Jolene" from a red-headed fan she once
met, and it stuck.
"Back when I was writing the songs like 'Jolene,' I was young.
I was experiencing all these feelings for the first time."
Throughout their marriage, there have been rumors that Parton cheated on Dean by having
a relationship with her female assistant.
Parton has denied that, but she has revealed that she once had an emotional affair.
In the book Dolly on Dolly: Interviews and Encounters With Dolly Parton, she shared a
little bit about that affair, which was rumored to be with her band leader Gregg Perry.
The affair made her so upset that she considered taking her own life.
She eyed a gun in her room for a long time and then held it, but she was stopped when
her dog Popeye appeared.
She confessed,
"The tap-tap of his paws jolted me back to reality, I suddenly froze and I put the gun
down."
And that's the only affair Parton has ever admitted, or likely ever will admit.
In a 2014 interview with The Guardian, she said,
"I'm not admitting nothin'.
Maybe I did.
Maybe I didn't.
Maybe I will.
Maybe I won't.
And it's none of your damn business!"
Maybe you've wondered why Carl Dean never seems to go anywhere high-profile with his
wife.
The explanation for that is fairly straightforward, as it turns out that he's extremely private.
When speaking at a concert in 2011, Parton revealed that she brought Dean to an event
in 1966 where they got all dressed up, and she received an award.
Afterwards, he turned to her 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!"
In a 2016 interview with Vogue, Parton explained that she respects her husband's decision to
stay out of the limelight, saying,
"My husband is not one who wants to be just thrown out there.
He's very private, and I've always respected that for him and about him."
She's also noted that even though Dean wants to be left out of her fame, he's nevertheless
always been supportive of her.
Even though they've been together for so long, Parton and Dean have never had any children.
Parton had a partial hysterectomy in 1984, and, while it was difficult for her to deal
with at first, she no longer regrets that they could never have kids.
In a 2014 interview with The Guardian, she said,
"My husband and I, when we first got married, we thought about if we had kids, what would
they look like?…Anyway, we talked about it, and we dreamed it, but it wasn't meant
to be.
Now that we're older?
We’re glad."
She also explained that, if she had kids, she probably would've had to have given up
everything else and thus wouldn't have had the career she's had.
Parton also told Billboard in 2014 that she used to think she should regret not having
kids, but now she's so close to her nieces and nephews that it doesn't matter.
As she put it,
"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.'"
In 2016, Parton released the album Pure & Simple, which is full of love songs.
It's easy to assume that she wrote the tracks with her husband in mind, and it turns out
that assumption would be correct.
In fact, she told Rolling Stone that she was inspired by their 50th anniversary.
As she explained it,
"I was just trying to think about all the different colors of love through the years.
I thought, 'Well I'm going to write about mine and Carl's relationship.
It's just a pure and simple relationship,' so it started with that and then I thought,
'Well why don't I just write a whole album of love songs?'"
The album isn't just about her relationship with Dean, as some songs cover other types
of romance, but it's still lovely to know that a husband is inspiring his wife to make
beautiful music.
When Parton stopped by The Tonight Show in November 2018, she told host Jimmy Fallon
a surprisingly intimate detail about her husband.
It turns out there's a famous actress with whom he'd like to have a threesome, and that
actress would be Jennifer Aniston.
The Friends alum starred in the 2018 movie Dumplin', which featured a soundtrack of Parton's
songs.
Parton admitted that she's a huge fan of Aniston and that her husband is "crazy about her."
She even said that he was more excited about his wife getting to do a movie with Aniston
than he was about her getting to write all the music.
"I think he kind of fantasizes, like, a threesome with us."
"Carl!
Hey!
Carl!
Go to bed!"
So what did Aniston think about all this?
When asked by USA Today for a response, she said,
"My mouth just dropped.
And then I laughed my (butt) off.
That's Dolly."
Carl Dean doesn't just dislike going to public events and being photographed.
He also doesn't even like to watch his wife perform live!
In an interview on The Ellen DeGeneres Show, Parton said that Dean has only seen her perform
live a small number of times.
As she described it,
"He gets nervous seeing me perform, cause it's almost like seeing your kid in a recital.
He's afraid I'll mess up.
Actually, he has seen me a time or two and it did relax him a little.
He saw that I do mess up and it's okay 'cause people are not gonna punish me for it."
Parton also said that she doesn't really show her husband the music she writes and that
he doesn't always listen to it either, unless she essentially forces him to.
It makes sense, as Dean seems to be so private that he doesn't really like anything that
has to do with his wife's mega-fame.
"He doesn't dislike it, but he doesn't go out of his way to play my records, let's put
it that way."
We all know Dolly Parton as "Dolly Parton" and not "Dolly Dean."
But as it turns out, she does use her husband's name in private.
In a 2014 interview with The Guardian, she revealed that she quietly took her husband's
last name, and in fact her passport says "Dolly Parton Dean."
She also explained that she signs all of her contracts with the name "Dean."
She never made the name change publicly because of her record deal, noting that it made no
sense, as he never asked her to.
That's not an uncommon move among people in the entertainment industry, as many newly
married celebrities don't change the names they were known as before they got hitched.
"'Dolly Dean' sounded like a fake name anyway.
We had Jimmy Dean and all this, James Dean-"
"I love Jimmy Dean sausages!"
"I know.
But, yeah, so do I."
For Dolly Parton and Carl Dean, it doesn't matter because she says she's "Dolly Dean"
whenever she's home.
She told The Guardian,
"But then I'm also Dolly Parton.
I'm Dolly Parton Dean.
I'm myself!…Anyway, if I had chosen the name Dolly Dean...I'd have been Double D.
Again!"
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