Dolly Parton's father grew up poor and never got the chance to learn to read.
Inspired by her upbringing, the 78-year-old country music legend has made it her mission over the past three decades to improve literacy through her Imagination Library book giveaway program. It has expanded statewide in places like Missouri and Kentucky, two of 21 states where all children under the age of 5 can enroll to have books mailed to their homes monthly.
To celebrate, she made stops Tuesday in both states to promote the program and tell the story of her father, Robert Lee Parton, who died in 2000.
“In the mountains, a lot of people never had a chance to go to school because they had to work on the farms,” she said at the Folly Theater in Kansas City, Missouri. “They had to do whatever it took to keep the rest of the family going.”
