Dolly Parton on how she marked first wedding anniversary after Carl Dean's death

Dolly Parton recently visited her wedding destination to mark her first wedding anniversary since her late husband Carl Dean's death. 

The Jolene singer, 79, spoke of her experience just two days later in an interview with FOX News' America Reports on Thursday.

"We got married down in Ringgold, Georgia," Parton began. "And we would always go down to Ringgold so — in and around our anniversary every year since we were married," the singer began of her 59th wedding anniversary with the late businessman.

She continued, "And so I went down there the other day on our anniversary. And they put a big plaque up in the yard of that church where we got married. It talks about us getting married there."

The 11-time Grammy winner also recalled her and Dean's tradition of enjoying a picnic there every year on their wedding anniversary.

"So, anyway, that’s where I spent my anniversary, our first — my first — our anniversary without him, the first one," she said. "So I thought, well, I have got to go back and just take a picture on that — on the same steps at that same church."

"And I put his wedding ring around my little gold chain and wore it," she said. "And I wore my little original wedding rings and just stood there. And it was just so — it was just so sweet, and it made me. It was good for me.”

Parton also admitted to feeling his presence as if "he was there with me." Dean, Parton's husband of nearly 60 years, died in March 2025.