LOS ANGELES, CALIFORNIA: Dolly Parton is renowned for being generous. She is not just a highly successful musician but is also well-known for her charitable work. However, even the Queen of Country engaged in some terrible mischief when she was younger. Parton once remarked that she thinks every child possesses a small amount of meanness.
Dolly Rebecca Parton had 11 siblings who shared a home, and she was born in a one-bedroom cottage. Even though she attained the heights of fame, the singer-songwriter learned from her early experiences that it was equally important to share her accomplishment with others. Parton is actively involved in a lot of social causes other than music, and she has significantly donated millions to those in need.
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'Certain kind of devilment is going to enter kid's mind'
In her first memoir, 'Dolly Parton: My Life and Other Unfinished Business,' Parton stated, "I believe you could take a kid and raise him in a vacuum and never show him anything but kindness, and there is still a certain kind of devilment that is going to enter that kid’s mind."
Parton went on to write: "Of course that theory could never be tested because it would be unkind to raise a kid in a vacuum in the first place. That sort of inevitable meanness must have been what led me to torment the chickens that ran in our yard." The Parton cabin's flooring was so widely spaced apart that one could see the family's chickens through the gaps below. One could even throw some leftover food their way. Young Dolly, however, did more than just give the chickens food, as per Showbiz CheatSheet.
"I figured that if the chickens could be lured into pecking up through the cracks, a little girl with quick fingers could grab them by the beaks and hold them above the ground for a few seconds, causing them to thrash about and bear their wings as if they had been set upon by the devil himself," she wrote in her memoir. "This plan was successfully carried out enough times to give every chicken in the yard a sore beak and a wisdom about sticking her nose into cracks."
Parton and her brothers had a favorite chicken despite the trick she would pull on the chickens. Her name was Penny. Everyone made an effort to dismiss the possibility that Penny will one day be served at the table. Parton further wrote in her memoir: "This scraggly-looking red hen could only be described as goofy. If she had been a human being, she definitely would have been institutionalized."
Dolly Parton’s biggest philanthropic efforts
Despite possessing meanness as a child, Dolly Parton has always been well-known for her good deeds. There includes a timeline of the country star's biggest charitable endeavors, along with her support for the Black and LGBTQ+ communities, substantial donations to the Barbara Davis Center for Childhood Diabetes, Save the Music Foundation, the Boot Campaign, and more, as per Billboard.
With a view to lowering the high school dropout rate, Parton initially founded the Dollywood Foundation in her native Sevier County, Tennessee. Once the Buddy Program was established, Parton gave $500 to each seventh- and eighth-grader who successfully completed high school. The organization claims that the project was effective because the dropout rate dropped from 35% to only 6%.
Dollywood, a theme park in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee, was created in 1961 and is based on Dolly Parton's childhood aspirations. Although it offers a variety of water rides and roller coasters, Parton has never actually been on any of them. In 2019, she stated to The New York Times, "I don't ride the rides."
The largest group of "non-releasable" bald eagles is housed in the 30,000-square-foot aviary run by the American Eagle Foundation. The US Fish and Wildlife Service presented Parton with the Partnership Award in 2003 in recognition of her work to protect the bald eagle.
Parton established the My People Fund to expand her wildfire relief efforts, giving families whose houses were totally devastated by the natural disaster $1,000 per month for six months. Additionally, almost $8.9 million was given to those in need through the fund. The program continues to assist individuals in covering the costs of their housing, electricity, food, and mental health services.
In April 2020, as the coronavirus started to spread internationally, the icon donated $1 million to Vanderbilt University's study of the illness, which helped pay for Moderna's Covid-19 vaccine. Moderna's vaccine is 94.5% effective against coronavirus, based on data presented, making it the second vaccination with a high success rate.