Dolly Parton's gravesite — Peaceful Dove Cemetery

Dolly Parton is still living as of this writing, but her family gravesite in the Sevierville area of East Tennessee is a documented landmark. Her parents Robert Lee Parton and Avie Lee Owens Parton are buried at the Dry Branch Baptist Church cemetery in Sevier County, the same community where Dolly grew up. She has spoken publicly about her intention to be buried in East Tennessee near her family when her time comes, consistent with the deep rootedness in place that runs through her music and her public identity.

The Sevierville and Sevier County area that produced Dolly Parton has become a significant heritage tourism destination built partly around her legacy: Dollywood in Pigeon Forge, the statue in downtown Sevierville, the childhood home marker, and the Dolly Parton Highway (US Route 441) that runs through the region. The emotional geography of her music — the mountains, the poverty, the large family in the small cabin, the specific landscape of East Tennessee — is physically present and accessible in ways that many musical biographies are not.

Dry Branch Baptist Church in Sevier County is where her parents and other family members are buried. The church and cemetery are in an area that retains the rural character of the community Parton has described throughout her career.