Robert Lee Parton, Dolly's Dad, Passes Away
William Cox
Bill
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Lee Parton, father of famous singer, dies
November 14, 2000
By Terry Morrow, News-Sentinel entertainment writer
Dolly Parton was definitely her daddy's little girl.
The singer-actress often talked of her love for her father, Lee Parton, who
died Sunday at Baptist Hospital of East Tennessee. The elder Parton was
admitted to the hospital on Oct. 31 after suffering a stroke.
She said during a late-summer interview that her success in business was a
legacy for her family, and specifically her father.
"It makes me happy because ... it makes my people proud. It's like something I
have done for my parents and my cousins and my friends," she said. "It lets me
carry on Daddy's name, in a way, like a good (child) would."
Lee Parton, a Sevier County farmer who worked many odd jobs to make ends meet,
was 79. He and wife Avie Lee had 12 children.
Parton often reminisced about her father's sacrifice for his family. Briefly
during Dolly's childhood, he moved to Detroit to find work. He didn't stay
there long, the singer recounts, because his heart belonged to the hills of
East Tennessee.
After Parton became a famous singer, she penned "Smoky Mountain Memories" as a
tribute to her father, his love for his family and the Smoky Mountains. She
recorded other songs with a fatherly theme: "Daddy" and "Daddy Come and Get Me"
were both Top 40 singles for her early in her career.
If it is true that Parton and her siblings inherited their musical skills from
her mother's side of the family, then they got their flash and love for
attention from their father's side. Each year he rode beside his superstar
daughter in a parade honoring her.
He also appeared in many of Parton's network TV specials. In one special that
aired on ABC in the late 1980s, Lee Parton was seen escorting his daughter
around Sevier County in a sleigh and a beat-up pickup truck. He often attended
his famous daughter's public events in East Tennessee with a proud smile on his
face.
A man who did not have much formal education, Lee Parton was never ashamed of
his background or his mountain heritage.
He and his wife lived a relatively quiet life in an unassuming farmhouse on a
large hill near the Sevierville city limits. It's a place where Parton's most
ardent fans would drive by and occasionally feel comfortable enough to stop to
talk to him.
*********
PARTON, ROBERT LEE - age 79, of Sevierville, Tennessee, passed away Sunday,
November 12, 2000 at The Baptist Hospital of East Tennessee in Knoxville. Mr.
Parton was a farmer and a construction worker. He was preceded in death by his
parents, Bessie (Rayfield) and Walter Parton; son, Larry Parton; brothers and
sisters, Margie, Oscar, Earl and Winford Parton; father-in-law and
mother-in-law, Jake and Rena (Valentine) Owens; sister-in-law, and
brother-in-law, Estelle Watson and Lester Owens. Survivors: wife, Avie Lee
Owens Parton; children and spouses, Willadeene Parton, David and Kay Parton,
Denver and Carolyn Parton, Dolly and Carl Dean, Bobby and Angie Parton, Stella
Parton, Cassie Parton, Randy and Deb Parton, Freida Parton, Floyd Parton,
Rachel and Eric George; grandchildren, Mitchell Blalock, Donna Lashlee, Dena
Bell, Chris and Jennifer Parton, Clint and Danielle Parton, Bryan and Rebecca
Seaver, Tim Rauhoff, Tever and Heidi Parton, Jada Anderson, Hannah Dennison;
great-grandchildren, Jordan and Jared Bell; brothers and sisters, Orville, Ray,
Leonard and Fred Parton, Hazel Whaley, Christine Rickman, Irmatrude Barnes and
Ora Dale Grey; sister-in-law and brothers-in-law, Dorothy Jo Owens, Henry,
Louis, Bill and Alden Owens. The family will receive friends 6-9 p.m. Tuesday,
November 14, 2000 at Atchley Funeral Home, Sevierville, Tennessee.
www.atchleyfuneralhome.com
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MadCow57
just die on his own?
Terrymelin
Terry Ellsworth
Ejucaided Redneck
>
> On 15 Nov 2000 13:39:24 GMT, terry...@aol.com (Terrymelin) wrote:
>
> >One dies; one does not "pass away." Unless you are talking about gas.
>
>
> One does not badmouth a term simply because one does not agree with said term's
> usage. One must check one's dic, which -- in Merriam Webster's case -- says:
>
> /pass away/ -- intrans. v. -- 13th c. -- 1) To go out of existence. 2) To die.
>
Earlier this year I had to do some research into the back issues of what
passes for a newspaper in my small Appalachian town, and discovered that
until around 1960 nobody around here died, at least not according to the
obituaries.
Instead, people:
...passed away
...went home to Jesus
...were called to Glory
...met their maker
First lines of three obituaries I saved:
Time has come and passed, the death angel has been busy seeking with its
sickle that person whose time on earth has been spent, and whom God has
seen fit to call to their reward, and on last Tuesday, June 4, visited
at the home of Mrs. Eliza Jane Sloan, wife of Esbon Sloan, and called
her to take up her abode in heaven \nth those who had gone on before her
to dwell forever and forever.
In Loving Memory--Just a word or two in memory and loving tribute to
Mrs. Melvina McCormick of Triplett , Rowan County Kentucky, who passed
to the spirit world January 12, at the age of 71 years.
Again death has entered our midst and while she was bent with years of
toil and burden, with a circle of those nearest and dearest to her about
her bedside, the spirit of Mrs. Lucinda Enix Hamilton, fled from its
pain-racked temple of mortality and sought peace and eternal rest
beyound the mysterious curtain, which separates this from the higher and
more beautiful spiritual existence of those departed.
--
http://rlsloan.netbasix.com/
Stories, poetry, "Notes From the Top of the Hill,"
and some funny stuff.
Listen to MP3 "notes" at
http://www.morehead-st.edu/units/wmky/wmky_reports.htm
Audio cassettes at http://www.countrytraditions.com/
(Click on "Appalachian Stories")
JNAP Death Troll
<briarh...@yall.com> wrote:
>GO-SPAM-YO-...@bigfoot.com wrote:
>>
>> On 15 Nov 2000 13:39:24 GMT, terry...@aol.com (Terrymelin) wrote:
>>
>> >One dies; one does not "pass away." Unless you are talking about gas.
>>
>> Since when?
>>
>> One does not badmouth a term simply because one does not agree with said term's
>> usage. One must check one's dic, which -- in Merriam Webster's case -- says:
>>
>> /pass away/ -- intrans. v. -- 13th c. -- 1) To go out of existence. 2) To die.
>>
>
>Earlier this year I had to do some research into the back issues of what
>passes for a newspaper in my small Appalachian town, and discovered that
>until around 1960 nobody around here died, at least not according to the
>obituaries.
>
>Instead, people:
>
>...passed away
>...went home to Jesus
>...were called to Glory
>...met their maker
Those three examples you gave were precious. True Appalachian poetry.
Where I work, people don't have "funerals". They have "home going
services."
bgregg
> One dies; one does not "pass away." Unless you are talking about gas.
>
> Terry Ellsworth
Sorry, Terry, here in the South we pass away. Always have, always
will.
Slipslope
gregory...@gmail.com
jennifer....@gmail.com
taylorp...@gmail.com
> Did the family faction that wanted his life support pulled prevail, or did he
> just die on his own?