Dolly Parton’s Half-Century Love Story With Husband Carl Dean: Their Complete Relationship Timeline

Her best-kept secret. Dolly Parton and her husband, Carl Dean, have been married for more than 50 years, but they’re rarely seen together — and that’s just the way they like it.

The country icon first met her future spouse when she moved to Nashville in 1964 to start her music career. They tied the knot within two years of meeting each other, but as Parton’s star rose, Dean kept to himself. Eventually, fans started to wonder if the “Jolene” singer’s husband even existed.

“He just don’t have any desire to be in show business,” the Tennessee native told Playboy in October 1978. “He don’t want to have his picture in the paper. He don’t want to go out to the supermarket and have people say, ‘That’s Dolly Parton’s husband.’”

Though the Grammy winner — the fourth of 12 children — grew up in a huge family, she and Dean never had any kids of their own. Parton, however, is known for her Imagination Library charity, which has sent more than 100 million free books to young children since she founded it in 1995.

“God has a plan for everything,” the 9 to 5 actress explained during an October 2017 interview with the Today show. “I think it probably was his plan for me not to have kids so everybody’s kids could be mine. And they are now.”

To hear Parton tell it, she and Dean have still managed to have plenty of fun as a twosome over the years. “We take off in our camper or go to our lake house,” the music superstar wrote in her 1994 memoir, Dolly: My Life and Other Unfinished Business. “We might go on a picnic somewhere, and then decide to stay overnight. Then we’ll go to a ‘drive up to your room’ motel.”

In May 2016, the couple celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary, and Dean released a rare statement about his famous wife. “My first thought was, ‘I’m gonna marry that girl,’” he recalled of his first encounter with Parton. “My second thought was, ‘Lord, she’s good-lookin.’ And that was the day my life began. I wouldn’t trade the last 50 years for nothing on this earth.”

The duo also commemorated the occasion by renewing their vows in a private ceremony in Nashville. “If I had it to do all over, I’d do it all over again, and we did,” Parton said at the time. “I’m dragging him kicking and screaming into the next 50 years. Wish us luck.”

Keep scrolling for a look back at Parton and Dean’s romance:

1964
The day after graduating from high school, Parton moved to Nashville from her hometown of Sevierville to pursue her singing career. That same day, she met Dean outside the Wishy Washy Laundromat. “I guess kind of in the back of my mind I was maybe flirtin’ a little,” she recalled in a 1970 interview with The Tennesseean. “But mainly I was just bein’ friendly because I’d always been the kind of person who would speak back and smile.”

May 1966
The duo tied the knot in a ceremony attended only by Parton, her mother, Dean, the preacher and his wife. “I like the way he loves me,” Parton told Playboy of her husband in 1978. “His understanding of me and the things I do. The way he lets me be free. And lets me be me.”

January 1979
While interviewing Parton for a profile, a Cosmopolitan reporter finally caught a glimpse of Dean. “Tall and good-looking, rather like a young Gregory Peck, he has a way of moving his angular body so that he seems to come toward you in sections,” the article read. “He is a fan of television and nightclub comic Steve Martin.”

January 1981
The “Eagle When She Flies” songstress opened up about her relationship with Dean in a candid interview with Playgirl, saying that the pair “never” argue. “Sometimes we’ll get a little touchy if we’re tired or aggravated,” she explained. “We never put ourselves in a situation where we bicker back and forth.”

May 2016
The Steel Magnolias star and Dean renewed their vows to celebrate their 50th wedding anniversary. To commemorate the occasion, Parton’s 1966 wedding dress and Dean’s suit were displayed in the Chasing Rainbows Museum at Dollywood.

August 2016
Parton recorded some of her favorite love songs for her 45th studio album, Pure & Simple. She originally wrote and recorded two of the tracks, “Say Forever You’ll Be Mine” and “Tomorrow Is Forever,” early in her marriage to Dean.

October 2020
Parton explained that she keeps Dean out of the spotlight because he would “never get a minute’s peace” if he accompanied her in public. “He’s right about that,” she told Entertainment Tonight. “It’s just not who he is. He’s, like, a quiet, reserved person.”

December 2020
During an episode of the “Table Manners With Jessie Ware” podcast, Parton joked that she and her husband may finally have tired of one another after nearly 60 years together. “I’m sure he’s sick of me,” she quipped. “My husband and I have been together for 57 years, been married 54, and I’m sick of him.”

July 2021
After joking that she wanted to pose for Playboy again for her 75th birthday, Parton recreated her Playboy cover for Dean’s birthday. “My husband always loved the original cover of Playboy, so I was trying to think of something to do to make him happy,” she said in an Instagram video that showed her dressed in bunny ears and a bowtie. “He still thinks I’m a hot chick after 57 years — and I’m not going to try to talk him out of that.”

November 2021
Parton gave fans a rare glimpse of Dean when she posted a throwback photo of the couple for Thanksgiving. “Happy #Thanksgiving from me and mine to you and yours,” she wrote via Instagram.

January 2022
“You find little ways,” the Run Rose Run author exclusively told Us about how the pair kept the romance alive after more than 50 years together. “Like, last year on his birthday, I dressed up in my Playboy bunny suit, made him breakfast and [ran] around in that for a little while.”

She continued: “You know, most people can keep a marriage [going strong] if you make a little effort. … We’re the perfect partners. We both have [a] great sense of humor. We’re able to, like, solve any problems and any situation, making a joke about it and not letting it get too heavy, but we respect each other and we like each other. We lucked up, let’s put it that way.”

February 2022
Parton celebrated Valentine’s Day with a rare throwback photo of her and Dean sharing a smooch. “Happy Valentine’s Day y’all!” she wrote via Instagram. “Remember to squeeze your loved ones a little tighter today and tell them you love ’em!”

December 2022
“I like it when people say, ‘How did it last so long?’ I say, ‘I stay going.’ You know, there’s a lot to be said about that. So, we’re not in each other’s face all the time. He’s not in the business, so we have different interests, but yet we have the things we love to do together. So, it was meant to be, I think. He was the one I was supposed to have and vice versa,” Parton told ET Canada, adding that their “warped sense of humor” keeps the pair laughing. “And I think humor, honestly, is one of the best things when you’re married like that. Even if you have a problem, if you have a great sense of humor, if you say something you can’t take back, [you] usually have some crazy way of getting out of it.”

She concluded: “We’ve never had, you know, serious arguments to say bad things to each other we have to take back.”

January 2023
Parton exclusively told Us Weekly that she and Dean “have a lot to talk about” because they don’t do the same things. “I wanna know what’s been going on in his world,” she explained. “He enjoys hearing about what’s going on in mine as long as he doesn’t have to be part of it and be put on the spot with doing any of of that. But we get along great. We’ve had a good life. We’re really compatible as people.”

October 2023
The country star revealed which one of her famous hairdos her husband doesn’t love. “When I wear my hair too stationary,” she said in an interview with Entertainment Tonight. “I said, ‘You don’t like my hair?’ And he said, ‘Well, it looks too important.’ There’s a certain look that looks important.”