Businessman Carl Dean, and husband of almost 60 years to veteran country singer Dolly Parton, has passed away.
The 82-year-old passed away in his hometown of Nashville, Tennessee, yesterday (March 3) – just nine years after renewing his wedding vows with the ‘9 to 5’ hitmaker.
Dolly Parton and her husband Carl Dean had been together for 59 years (Instagram/@dollyparton)
The entrepreneur’s 79-year-old wife Parton has issued the following statement: “Carl and I spent many wonderful years together. Words can’t do justice to the love we shared for over 60 years. Thank you for your prayers and sympathy.”
While their family have also asked for ‘privacy during this difficult time’.
Dean is survived by his siblings Sandra and Donnie, and will be laid to rest in a private ceremony with immediate family.
During a chat on the Dumb Blonde podcast last year, the then 78-year-old musician recalled: “He said, ‘Look, now I want you to do everything you want to do, and I wish you the best, but don’t ever ask me to go to another one of these damn things because I ain’t going,’ and he never did.”
Parton wasn’t surprised by her newlywed husband’s decision at the time, because he was never interested in having the spotlight on him.
“He loves music, but he’s not the least bit interested in being in it,” she said. “And he told me that right up front.”
Their marriage had stood the test of time and the couple even renewed their vows in 2016 at their Nashville home.
It sounds like Parton and Dean were complete opposites and not just because of their feelings about fame. “He’s quiet and I’m loud, and we’re funny… we have a lot of fun,” she added.
“Anytime [there is] too much tension going on, either one of us can like, find a joke about it to really break the tension, where we don’t let it go so far,” she explained.
“We never fought back and forth.”
Dean wished to remain a low-profile and so Parton would never bring him on stage (Terry Wyatt/WireImage)
The pair met back in 1964 outside the Wishy Washy Laundromat in Nashville, Tennessee. Parton was 18 and Dean was 21. Sparks flew as Dean drove past in his pickup truck when he saw Parton outside and ‘hollered’ at her, she told The New York Times in 1976.
During Parton’s historic rise to fame, her husband supported her behind the scenes while maintaining a road-paving business.
They still managed to keep their spark burning decades later, as Parton revealed in 2022 that she still dresses up for her man at home.
“Every day, I put on some makeup and fix my hair because I think, ‘Well, the whole world, I’m out here and everybody else sees me all dressed up, and I’m not going to just kind of go home and just flop on him,’” she told E! News.
