A legacy beyond music

Dolly Parton’s legacy reaches far beyond the stage, with her lifelong generosity, love of literacy and enduring partnership with Rotary continuing to put books into the hands of children around the world.

Dolly Parton spent more than six decades proving that sass and substance were never mutually exclusive.

The world collectively mourned, when we heard that the beloved singer, songwriter, actor, businesswoman and philanthropist passed away on 25 August 2026, aged 80.

Dolly sold more than 100 million records worldwide and won 11 Grammy Awards. She wrote some of music’s most enduring songs, crossed successfully into film, and was inducted into both the Country Music Hall of Fame and the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame.

But beyond the songs, stilettos and famously self-deprecating humour was a sustained commitment to helping others.

Dolly established The Dollywood Foundation in 1988 with an initial focus on educational in her home county of Sevier County, Tennessee. Her most enduring humanitarian project followed in 1995: Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library.

The inspiration was deeply personal. Dolly’s father left school early and never learned to read or write. She later said she believed his inability to read prevented him from achieving some of his dreams. And so, the Imagination Library was born.

Children enrolled in the program receive a free, age-appropriate book in the mail every month from birth until their fifth birthday. Family income does not determine eligibility; where a local program operates, every preschool child can participate.

What began in one Tennessee county expanded across the United States and then internationally to Canada, the United Kingdom, Australia and Ireland. To date, more than 330 million books have been distributed worldwide. Australia joined the program in 2013 through a partnership with United Way Australia, and more than two million books have since reached Australian children.

Rotary has been part of that story for more than 15 years.

A collaboration between Rotary International and the Imagination Library was announced in 2009, encouraging Rotary clubs to help bring the program into their own communities. By 2010, more than 140 Rotary clubs were already involved.

Rotary International is listed as a growth partner of the Imagination Library in Australia, while individual clubs and groups of clubs provide the local funding and support that turn the international program into something tangible for families. In the Illawarra, NSW, Rotary clubs have supported an Imagination Library since 2014; by November 2025, around 180 books were being mailed to local children each month. Rotary clubs are also among the community supporters of the established program in Tamworth.

Literacy was only one part of Dolly’s philanthropy. After the devastating Tennessee wildfires in 2016, her My People Fund provided direct financial assistance to families who had lost their homes. In 2020, she donated US$1 million to Vanderbilt University Medical Centre, supporting research that contributed to the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine. Her broader philanthropic work was recognised with the Carnegie Medal of Philanthropy in 2022.

For Rotarians, perhaps the most striking element of Dolly’s legacy is the simplicity of the Imagination Library idea: put a good book into a child’s hands, then do it again next month.

As Dolly once said, she wanted children to receive books not because somebody had labelled them disadvantaged, but simply because “their community loves them”.

It is difficult to imagine a more fitting connection between this global icon and Rotary: doing good one community, one child, one book at a time.