By Khalil Garriott
If not for a flirtatious bank teller, how would have the universally beloved Queen of Country’s career played out?
(With 11 Grammys, 25 No. 1 hits on Billboard’s Hot Country Songs chart and more than 100 million records sold, she would have been just fine.)
Dolly Parton, the songwriter, was one of one; she wrote arguably her two best-known songs, “Jolene” and “I Will Always Love You” on the same day. The former, released in 1973, has been covered by more than 30 artists and was ranked No. 63 on Rolling Stone’s list of the 500 Greatest Songs of All Time.
The banking connection is a fun one to uncover. Parton noticed that her husband, Carl Dean, was spending a lot of time at a local bank. He and a bank employee had mutual crushes; Parton observed him exchanging in flirty banter with a “beautiful, redheaded, long-legged” bank teller.
“I knew we didn’t have the kind of money for him to be spending that kind of time at the bank,” she said in 2020 with a laugh.
In 2008, Parton reflected on one of her biggest hits in a prolific catalogue of them.
“She got this terrible crush on my husband,” Parton said. “And he just loved going to the bank because she paid him so much attention. It was kinda like a running joke between us — I was saying, ‘Hell, you’re spending a lot of time at the bank. I don’t believe we’ve got that kind of money.’ So, it’s really an innocent song all around but sounds like a dreadful one.”
She told her husband, who died in March 2025, to quit it — then took to pen and paper to express her feelings through a catchy chorus:
Jolene, Jolene, Jolene, Jolene
I’m begging of you please don’t take my man
Jolene, Jolene, Jolene, Jolene
Please don’t take him just because you can.
The song’s themes of insecurity, vulnerability, inadequacy and fear of a partner straying are relatable to anyone. Generations of listeners later found new meaning in the song’s many renditions across multiple genres and several languages. While “Jolene” — praised for its simplicity with just 200 words — was based on a real banker, the renowned singer chose the name Jolene because of a memorable interaction with an autograph-seeking young fan of the same name.
Despite being frustrated by her husband’s public flirtation with a bank teller, all’s well that ends well. They were married for nearly six decades until his death last year.
“I want you folks to know that something good can come from anything,” Parton said in 2014. “Had it not been for that woman, I would never have written ‘Jolene’ and I wouldn’t have made all that money. So, thank you, Jolene.”
The world lost a lot of sparkle when the iconic Dolly Parton, an American original, died Tuesday at age 80.
