IN 1976, BEFORE SHE WROTE THE BOOK THAT WOULD MAKE HER A LEGEND, LORETTA LYNN ASKED HER HUSBAND WHETHER SHE SHOULD LEAVE OUT THE UGLY PARTS. She had reason to ask. Doolittle Lynn drank. He ran around. He had married her when she was fifteen and taken her a thousand miles from her mother. He leaned back in his chair and thought about it for a minute. Then he said: “Hell’s fire, Loretta, just tell the story the way it happened. I’ve always said you should never try to cover up things. Look, we’re not perfect. Let’s not pretend we are.” So she told it. All of it. Coal Miner’s Daughter sold millions and became a film that won an Oscar. The whole world got to read what kind of man he was. He died in 1996. Six years later, at 70 years old, she wrote a second memoir. She could have said anything she wanted about him by then. There was no one left to object. Instead she wrote this: “He thought I was something special, more special than anyone else in the world, and never let me forget it. Doo was my security, my safety net. And just remember — I’m explainin’, not excusin’.” He gave her permission to condemn him. She spent the rest of her life defending him instead.
Loretta Lynn, Doolittle Lynn, and the Hard Truth Behind a Famous Story In 1976, Loretta Lynn faced a question that…