On October 21, 2026, some of the biggest names in country music gathered at Belmont University’s Fisher Center for the Performing Arts in Nashville to sing Dolly Parton’s songs. The tribute came two months after Dolly’s death in August at 80. The next day, the Country Music Association announced what the night had produced: a $1 million donation to Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library, made together with Belmont University, The Walt Disney Company and the Nashville Convention & Visitors Corp.
CMA CEO Sarah Trahern described the goal in simple terms. Because of the artists and partners, she said, children for years to come can open a mailbox and find “a book with their name on it.”
To understand why that mailbox matters so much, you have to go back to a farmer in the Smoky Mountains who never got the chance to learn his letters.
The Man Who Couldn’t Read
Robert Lee Parton grew up in a large mountain family in East Tennessee, much like the one he and his wife Avie Lee later raised with their twelve children. In those hills, Dolly explained over the years, many children never went to school at all. They stayed home and worked the farm, because the family needed every pair of hands to get by.
Lee Parton was one of those children. He never learned to read or write. Dolly always said that had nothing to do with his intelligence. She called her father one of the smartest people she had ever known. But she also admitted that he was embarrassed that he couldn’t read.
The Parton home was not a house full of books. According to Dolly, the Bible was the only book she grew up with.
A Gift Built for Her Daddy
In 1995, Dolly started something small in her home county of Sevier County, Tennessee. Every enrolled child would receive one free, age-appropriate book in the mail each month, from birth until age five. Families would pay nothing, no matter their income.
She was open about who it was for. Dolly said the program was her way of honoring her father, pointing to the commandment to honor your father and mother. To her, that meant more than obeying your parents. It meant bringing honor to their name.
She hoped at first that it might do some good a couple of counties over. It did much more than that.
“The Book Lady” and a Proud Father
As the books started arriving, the children of Sevier County gave Dolly a new name. They called her “the Book Lady.”
Nothing she ever did on a stage seemed to move her father quite like that. Dolly said the kids calling her the Book Lady made him prouder than her fame did. In a 2014 interview she added that because he lived to see the program succeed, he felt that he had done something good too, since he was the reason it existed.
Lee Parton died in 2000. By then the program was beginning to spread beyond Sevier County, and he had seen enough to know what his struggle had started.
The Picture in the Office
Dolly made sure her father stayed part of the work. In a 2023 conversation with Apple Music, she described a large photograph of him that hangs in the Imagination Library office. In it, Lee Parton is dressed in a suit, which made the picture special to her, because, as she put it, “he never wore suits he always wore his farmer clothes.”
A man who could not read a single page now looks out over an office that sends books to millions of children. Dolly said she was proud of that.
From One County to Millions of Mailboxes
The program grew steadily. It mailed its millionth book in the United States in 2003, expanded into Canada in 2006, the United Kingdom in 2007, Australia in 2013 and the Republic of Ireland in 2019. Today it mails more than 3 million books every month and has gifted more than 300 million books since 1995.
One of the titles on its shelves is Dolly’s own 1996 children’s book, Coat of Many Colors, based on her song about the patchwork coat her mother sewed from scraps. Late in her life, Dolly said the Imagination Library had meant as much to her as nearly anything she had ever done, if not more.
The Night Nashville Sang for Her
The tribute, titled CMA Presents I Will Always Love You: A Celebration of Dolly Parton, aired live on ABC and Disney+. Even the tickets nodded to her, starting at $95 in homage to “9 to 5.”
Ashley McBryde sang “Coat of Many Colors.” Ella Langley took on “Jolene.” Carly Pearce and Kristin Chenoweth teamed up for “9 to 5.” Reba McEntire performed “He’s Alive” with the Belmont Singers. Zac Brown sang “Butterfly” alongside a recorded vocal from Dolly herself. To close, Carrie Underwood led the full cast through “I Will Always Love You.”
The People Carrying the Work Forward
Belmont University President Dr. Greg Jones said Dolly understood that one book could change the direction of a child’s life, and that the university was grateful to help put more books into young hands. Jeff Conyers, president and vice chair of The Dollywood Foundation, which runs the Imagination Library, said he could not imagine a more meaningful way to celebrate Dolly’s life than investing in the dreams of the next generation.
The special is now streaming on Disney+ and Hulu. Every one of those monthly books, mailed with a child’s name on it, traces back to a farmer in East Tennessee who never had the chance to read one.
Did your children or grandchildren ever receive a book from Dolly’s Imagination Library? We would love to hear about it in the comments.