It’s a bittersweet day for Dolly Parton, who is experiencing her first wedding anniversary without her husband, Carl Dean. The two were married on May 30, 1966, in Ringgold, Georgia. Dean passed away on March 3, 2025, a few months shy of what would have been their 59th wedding anniversary.
When Parton and Dean tied the knot, she was originally planning a big wedding. But Parton was a newly-signed artist to Monument Records, and was advised by then-label president Fred Foster to delay her wedding for one year. Undeterred, Parton traded her lavish ceremony for a simple affair, traveling to Georgia so the announcement wouldn’t be in the Nashville newspapers, with only Dean and Parton’s mother in attendance.
“It was just my mother and Carl and me,” Parton told CMT. “We went across the state line to Ringgold, Georgia. My mother made me a little white dress and a little bouquet and a little Bible. But I said, ‘I can’t get married in a courthouse because I’ll never feel married.’ So we found a little Baptist church in town, and went up to Pastor Don Duvall and said, ‘Would you marry us?’ We got pictures on the steps right outside the church.”
Parton waited a long time, but the Country Music Hall of Fame member eventually got her big ceremony, when Parton and Dean celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary in 2016.
“I missed the big long wedding dress the first time, so this time, we went all out,” she recalled. “I wore a Steve Summers dress. Carl looked great in his suit. Then we went down to Ringgold again and spent the night in our camper, went out to the lake for a few days. I finally got to have the wedding that I never got to have.”
Only people in Parton’s innermost circle got to know Dean, an arrangement that worked well for both of them.
“He does not want to be in the spotlight at all,” Parton said (via People). “It’s just not who he is. He’s like a quiet, reserved person and he figured if he ever got out there in that, he’d never get a minute’s peace and he’s right about that.”
Parton deeply misses Dean, whom she met when she was just 18 years old. But the 79-year-old reveals that his last few years were a struggle, which is why she is glad he is finally at peace.
“He did suffer a lot for the last few years,” Parton recently told Entertainment Tonight. “And there’s a part of me that’s happy he’s at peace and at rest. But then of course, there’s that part of me that will miss him forever and long for him every day. For the rest of my life, I’m sure.”
Parton is still working harder than ever, even as she struggles to find a new normal without her companion for more than six decades.
“Of course I miss him,” Parton said. “I’m having to really go through a lot trying to figure out how to be without him because I was with him for so long.”
Parton released “If You Hadn’t Been There” shortly after Dean passed away. Find the song, and all of Parton’s music, at DollyParton.com.
Photo Credit: Jim Wright