Loretta Lynn (; April 14, 1932 – October 4, 2022) was an American country music singer and songwriter. In a career spanning six decades, Lynn released multiple gold albums. She had numerous hits such as: "Hey Loretta", "The Pill", "Blue Kentucky Girl", "Love Is the Foundation", "You're Lookin' at Country", "You Ain't Woman Enough", "I'm a Honky Tonk Girl", "Don't Come Home A-Drinkin' (With Lovin' on Your Mind)", "One's on the Way", "Fist City", and "Coal Miner's Daughter". The 1980 musical film Coal Miner's Daughter was based on her life.
Lynn received many awards and other accolades for her groundbreaking role in country music, including awards from both the Country Music Association and Academy of Country Music as a duet partner and an individual artist. She was nominated 18 times for a Grammy Award and won three times. , Lynn was the most awarded female country recording artist and the only female ACM Artist of the Decade (the 1970s). Lynn scored 24 No. 1 hit singles and 11 number-one albums. She ended 57 years of touring on the road after she suffered a stroke in 2017 and broke her hip in 2018.
Early life and career
Lynn was born Loretta Webb in Butcher Hollow, Kentucky, on April 14, 1932. She was the oldest daughter and second child born to Clara Marie "Clary" (née Ramey; May 5, 1912 – November 24, 1981) and Melvin Theodore "Ted" Webb (June 6, 1906 – February 22, 1959). Ted was a coal miner and subsistence farmer. The family claims Cherokee heritage on Lynn's mother's side, but have not been officially recognized by that tribe. She was named after the film star Loretta Young. The other Webb children were:
Melvin "Junior" Webb (December 4, 1929 – July 2, 1993) Herman Webb (September 3, 1934 – July 28, 2018) Willie "Jay" Lee Webb (February 12, 1937 – July 31, 1996) Donald Ray Webb (April 2, 1941 – October 13, 2017) Peggy Sue Wright (née Webb; born March 25, 1943) Betty Ruth Hopkins (née Webb; born January 5, 1946) Crystal Gayle (born Brenda Gail Webb; January 9, 1951) Loretta's father Ted died at the age of 52 from a stroke four years after relocating with her mother and younger siblings to Wabash, Indiana. He had also been battling black lung disease at the time of his death.
Through her matriline, Lynn was distant cousins with country singer Patty Loveless.
On January 10, 1948, 15-year-old Loretta Webb married Oliver Vanetta "Doolittle" Lynn (August 27, 1926 – August 22, 1996), better known as "Doolittle", "Doo", or "Mooney". They had met only a month earlier. The Lynns left Kentucky and moved to the northwest Washington state logging community of Custer when Lynn was seven months pregnant with the first of their six children. The happiness and heartache of her early years of marriage would help to inspire Lynn's songwriting. In 1953, Doolittle bought her a $17 Harmony guitar (). She taught herself to play the instrument, and over the following three years, she worked to improve her guitar playing. With Doolittle's encouragement, she started her own band, Loretta and the Trailblazers, with her brother Jay Lee playing lead guitar. She often appeared at Bill's Tavern in Blaine, Washington, and the Delta Grange Hall in Custer, Washington, with the Pen Brothers' band and the Westerneers. She cut her first record, "I'm a Honky Tonk Girl", in February 1960.
Career
1960–1966: Early country success
Lynn began singing in local clubs in the late 1950s. She later formed her own band, the Trailblazers which included her brother Jay Lee Webb. Lynn won a wristwatch in a televised talent contest in Tacoma, Washington, hosted by Buck Owens. Lynn's performance was seen by Canadian Norm Burley of Zero Records, who co-founded the record company after hearing Loretta sing.
Zero Records president, Canadian Don Grashey, arranged a recording session in Hollywood, where four of Lynn's compositions were recorded, including "I'm A Honky Tonk Girl," "Whispering Sea," "Heartache Meet Mister Blues," and "New Rainbow." Her first release featured "Whispering Sea" and "I'm a Honky Tonk Girl". Lynn signed her first contract on February 2, 1960, with Zero. Her album was recorded at United Western Recorders in Hollywood, engineered by Don Blake and produced by Grashey. Musicians who played on the songs were steel guitar player Speedy West, fiddler Harold Hensley, guitarist Roy Lanham, Al Williams on bass, and Muddy Berry on drums. Lynn commented on the different sound of her first record: "Well, there is a West Coast sound that is definitely not the same as the Nashville sound [...] It was a shuffle with a West Coast beat".