Loretta Lynn and Patsy Cline Bonded Over ‘Girl Talk’ About Their Husbands When They Met
When country icon Loretta Lynn met her good friend Patsy Cline, the two hit it off immediately. They had a lot in common, though they were in different places in their careers. And one thing that bonded them was “girl talk” about their husbands.
Read on to learn why Cline was in the hospital when she met Lynn the first time, and what they talked about during their first meeting.
Loretta Lynn met Patsy Cline in the hospital thanks to their husbands
In Lynn’s memoir, Me & Patsy Kickin’ Up Dust, she wrote about the origins of her friendship with Cline. And it started when Cline was involved in a deadly 1961 car accident that nearly took her life.
She was thrown into the windshield and suffered severe injuries. She had “a broken and dislocated hip, a bad cut on her right arm, and her face was cut up awful,” according to Lynn. Her condition “looked hopeless” to doctors.
Cline eventually began to improve and was hospitalized to recover. During that time, she heard Lynn perform her hit “Walkin’ After Midnight” on a radio show. According to Lynn, Cline sent her husband, Charlie Dick, to find her.
“Patsy wants to see you,” Dick told Lynn. “She wants me to bring you to the hospital.”
The “Fist City” singer was happy but also confused by the unexpected invitation, and said she almost “had a fit” over it. But she couldn’t go to Cline then because the day’s visiting hours were over. So, Lynn’s husband, Oliver, took her to the hospital the next day.
Loretta Lynn and Patsy Cline had a lot in common and bonded over ‘girl talk’ about their husbands
Lynn shared that she hit it off with Cline right away. Though she was still trying to make a place for herself in country music, Cline was already an established star. But they still had much in common.
“We were the same age. We both grew up poor. Both of us had to grow up too fast,” Lynn wrote in her memoir. “Neither of us went to high school.”
According to Lynn, Oliver was the first boy she ever kissed, and she started having babies when she “wasn’t more than a girl” herself. She had four kids by the time she got to Nashville.
Meanwhile, Cline dropped out of school and went to work to help support her mother and siblings. She’d been singing professionally for more than a decade and was in her second marriage when she met Lynn. And she had two young children.
So, the two stars of the Grand Ole Opry had plenty to talk about the day they met. “[Of course] there was girl talk about our husbands, once Charlie and Doo left the room,” Lynn noted. “Those boys gave us plenty to talk about.
Before Lynn left the hospital, Cline invited her for dinner. And there was no way the “Coal Miner’s Daughter” was saying no.
Loretta Lynn thought news of Patsy Cline’s death was ‘baloney’
They were the best of friends until March 1963. And in her memoir, Lynn recalled the phone call she received when 30-year-old Cline died. “Baloney,” she told the caller. “Her and me’s going shopping.”
She hung up the phone, still not believing what she’d heard. But then news of the plane crash came over the radio, and she knew it was confirmed that Cline’s plane went down. “I’d lost the best friend I’d ever had,” Lynn wrote.
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