(KNSI) – Country music icon Dolly Parton has died at the age of 80.
Her family announced her death Tuesday in a video posted to Parton’s social media accounts. Her nephew, Bryan Seaver, delivered the news on behalf of the family. A statement says Parton died peacefully in Nashville. No cause of death was released.
Parton grew up in a one-room cabin in the Great Smoky Mountains and went on to write more than 3,000 songs, including “Jolene,” “Coat of Many Colors,” “9 to 5” and “I Will Always Love You.” She was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 2022. On screen, she starred in “9 to 5” and “Steel Magnolias,” and she opened her Dollywood theme park in eastern Tennessee in 1986.
Parton started her Imagination Library in 1995 as a tribute to her father, who could not read. The program mails a free book every month to children from birth to age five. It now reaches about 3 million children a month, including families right here in central Minnesota through United Way of Central Minnesota.
Parton’s husband of 59 years, Carl Dean, died last year.
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