Loretta Lynn is an American country music singer-songwriter, author and philanthropist. Born in Butcher Hollow, Kentucky to a coal miner father, Lynn married at 13 years old, was a mother soon after, and moved to Washington with her husband, Oliver Lynn. Their marriage was sometimes tumultuous; he had affairs and she was headstrong. Their experiences together became inspiration for her music.

When she was 24 years old, Lynn's husband bought her a guitar. She taught herself to play and cut her first record the next year. She became a part of the country music scene in Nashville in the 1960s, and in 1967 charted her first of 16 number 1 hits, out of 70 charted songs as a solo artist and a duet partner,  that include "Don't Come Home A' Drinkin' (With Lovin' on Your Mind)", "You Ain't Woman Enough", "Fist City", and "Coal Miner's Daughter".

She focused on blue collar women's issues with themes of philandering husbands and persistent mistresses, and pushed boundaries in the conservative genre of country music by singing about birth control "The Pill", repeated childbirth "One's on the Way", double standards for men and women "Rated "X"", and being widowed by the draft during the Vietnam War "Dear Uncle Sam".

She became known as "The First Lady of Country Music" and continues to be one of the most successful vocalists of all time.

 

Although Kitty Wells had become the first major female country vocalist during the 1950s, by the time Lynn recorded her first record, only three other women - Patsy Cline, Skeeter Davis, and Jean Shepard - had become top stars. By the end of 1962, it was clear that Lynn was on her way to becoming the fourth. Lynn credits Cline as her mentor and best friend during those early years, and as fate would have it, Lynn would follow her as the most popular country vocalist of the early 1960s and 1970s.

 

Her first self-penned song to crack the Top Ten, 1966’s "Dear Uncle Sam”, was among the very first recordings to recount the human costs of the Vietnam War. In the latter half of the decade, although she still worked within the confines of honky tonk, her sound became more personal, varied, and ambitious, particularly lyrically. Beginning with 1966's Number 1 hit in Cash Box, "You Ain't Woman Enough", Lynn began writing songs with a feminist viewpoint, which was unheard of in country music. This song made Loretta Lynn the first country female recording artist to pen a #1 hit.

In 1967, she reached #1 with "Don't Come Home A' Drinkin' (With Lovin' on Your Mind)". Her album, Don't Come Home A-Drinkin, went to number one and became one of the first albums by a female country artist to reach sales of 500,000 copies.

Her next album, Fist City was released in 1968. The title track became Lynn's second #1 hit, as a single in earlier that year, and the other single from the album, "What Kind of a Girl (Do You Think I Am)" peaked within the Top 10. In 1968 her next studio album, Your Squaw Is on the Warpath spawned two Top 5 Country hits, the title track and "You've Just Stepped In (From Stepping Out on Me)". In 1969 her next single, "Woman of the World (Leave My World Alone)" was Lynn's third chart-topper, followed by a subsequent Top 10, "To Make a Man (Feel Like a Man)".

 

 

 

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