Why the Girls at Dolly Parton’s School Didn’t Like Her

Dolly Parton is probably one of the most popular celebrities alive today. But, growing up, she was not very well liked at school, particularly by the other girls. 

The girls at school did not like Dolly Parton

Parton was never a fan of school. A big reason for that was that her peers weren’t a fan of her. 

“I was not well liked in school,” she wrote in her 1994 memoir, Dolly: My Life and Other Unfinished Business. “In fact, I was actively disliked by many–especially the other girls. I liked to dress flashy, and I had an unearned reputation for being a tramp. That reputation was fostered largely by girls who appeared to be goody-goodies all week but on Friday nights were something else altogether. When they made a car rock, it wasn’t from beating out songs on the dashboard.”

Thanks to the rumors about her, Parton was popular with the boys, but for false assumptions. This “tended to make [her] even less popular with the girls.”

“The irony was that the other girls’ mothers all thought I was a bad influence on them,” she wrote. 

Dolly Parton has always liked to wear tight clothes

Parton believes the way she’s always loved to dress probably only added fuel to the fire when it came to the rumors about her.  

“I became aware of my body at a very early age,” she wrote. “By the time I was twelve I had sprouted what some of the boys called ‘headlights.’ I was five feet two when I was twelve, and I have never grown another fraction since. I wanted to look sexy from the time I was about ten, but it didn’t go into overdrive until about thirteen.”

After the “Jolene” singer turned 13, nobody could stop her from dressing sexy. 

“I saved what money I could keep from The Cas Walker Show to buy peroxide, makeup, and sexy clothes,” she wrote. “I couldn’t get my hair big enough or ‘yaller’ enough. Couldn’t get my skirt tight enough, my blouses low enough. Couldn’t get my boobs to stand up high enough or squeeze them together close enough. Of course, I had to get away from home to really put on the dog.”

On taking sexy pictures and discovering push-up bras 

The “Two Doors Down” singer would go to the picture booth at Woolworth’s and practice her sexy poses. 

“[I’d] unbutton my blouse, push my headlights up with my arms, and take pictures,” she wrote. “On the next quarter, I’d pull my blouse down off my shoulder and practice my sexy look.”

At home, she’d look around for creative ways to stuff her bra. One day, she stumbled upon shoulder pads as the perfect solution.  

“I would sneak into the closet and cut the shoulder pads out of a woman’s coat, Grandma’s or somebody’s,” she wrote. “I’d do that in the middle of the summer when I knew they wouldn’t be missed for a long time.”

When she finally learned about push-up bras, the “Down From Dover” singer rejoiced.  

“That, to me, had to be the equal of the day Einstein figured out that relativity thing,” she wrote. “After all, it’s all relative. And now my relatives would have to go around in the winter with slumpy-looking shoulders.”

As a teenager, Parton loved experimenting with her look. It helped her find her signature style that she still rocks today, all these years later.