The Wall Street Journal - 03.04.2020

M8| Friday, April 3, 2020 THE WALL STREET JOURNAL.

running water and bathrooms.

After the war, he bought a

Philco radio. An entire universe

opened to us. We listened to the

Grand Ole Opry and the “Squeaky

Door,” a scary drama show.

I was in awe of Opry singers. I

never dreamed I’d ever see one let

alone sing there myself. Those

things seemed impossible.

Mommy taught me everything I

knew. She taught me how to sing

all them old hill songs. She was a

great singer. She also taught me to

garden. She was beautiful with ev-

erything she did.

My parents were different. Most

people in those hollers were kind

of lazy. They didn’t want to work.

But my parents rolled up their

sleeves. Mommy could do anything

she wanted to do.

One day in 1948, my one-room

school held what we called a pie

social. Boys bid on the pies of the

girls they liked best.

The boy who bid on my pie had

just returned from fighting in

MANSION

HOUSE CALL| LORETTA LYNN

She Was Born

A Homemaker’s

Daughter

The country singer-songwriter learned everything

from her mother in Butcher Holler, Ky.

O

ne of my chores when

I was 7 was to put my

four baby brothers

and sisters to sleep. I

did this by holding

one of them at a time in my arms

while rocking back and forth on

our porch bench swing.

While I rocked, I sang them

songs my mommy taught me, like

“The Great Titanic.” Daddy would

shout at me to

shut my big

mouth. “Every-

body all over the

holler can hear

you,” he’d say.

Igrewupin

Eastern Ken-

tucky, in Butcher

Holler, a handful

of cabins be-

tween two hills

divided by a

creek. We were

about a mile

from the main

road. Members

of our family

lived there.

I was the second of eight chil-

dren and was known as Loretty. My

mother named me after the actress

Loretta Young. Her picture ap-

peared often in my mother’s movie

magazines.

When the wind picked up and

whistled through them log walls of

our one-room cabin, Mommy tore

out pages and stuffed them in the

wall’s gaps.

Times were hard during the De-

pression, but hard times were

good, too. Everyone was close.

My daddy, Melvin Webb, was

known as Ted and worked for Roo-

sevelt’s WPA. Then he took a job in

the coal mines. My mommy, Clara

Marie, took care of all the kids and

the house. Of course, I helped.

My daddy’s cousin, Lee, liked

the sound of my voice. He had his

whiskey still on the side of the hill.

When I was 13, he came down to

our house and

told me to keep

singing. He also

urged Marie, my

cousin, to sing

with me. He’d

say, “Y’all keep

singing ’cause I

love to hear you

when my whis-

key’s running

off.”

Money was

tight. Thank

goodness

Mommy could

sew. She turned

burlap flour sacks

into dresses. I

didn’t see my first real dress until I

was 7. Someone who worked on

roads with Daddy for the WPA gave

him a blue dress with little pink

flowers.

Daddy was real bashful and

more easygoing than Mommy. He

wouldn’t talk much, but he always

had a smile on his face. When the

Depression eased and he worked in

the mine, he bought a house in

Butcher Holler with four rooms.

But it didn’t have electricity or

LORETTA ON PATSY CLINE

First Patsy Cline meeting? In the

hospital, after she heard me sing her

songs on the radio.

Why there? In ’61, she was hit head-

on by another car.

What did Cline hear in your voice?

I’m not sure. Probably my soul.

Why was she special? She was

slicker and more modern than every-

one else.

World War II. He won and had to

try a slice. Turns out I used salt in-

stead of sugar.

That didn’t matter. It was love

at first sight. That boy, Doolittle

Lynn, walked me home and kissed

me good-night. The next day he

came to see me and we started

dating. I was just 14. A month later,

we married.

Soon we moved to Washington

state so Doo could find work log-

ging. I was pregnant with the first

of our six children. In Custer,

Wash., in ’53, Doo bought me a gui-

tar so I had something to play

while singing to the babies.

Over the next three years I fig-

ured out how to play. All my family

played fiddle, banjo or guitar. I had

been there watching when they

did.

Today, I live in a nice, little mod-

ern house in Hurricane Mills,

Tenn. We built it behind the planta-

tion home that Doo and I lived in for

40 years that’s now my museum.

Thinking back on things I did as

a kid, I loved climbing trees.

Mommy could hardly keep me out

of them. I’d climb right to the very

top. Once I got up there, I could

see everywhere, all around. That’s

how I figured out there was a big

world out there.

—As told to Marc Myers

Loretta Lynn, 87, is a country

singer-songwriter and a recipient

of the Presidential Medal of Free-

dom. She is the author of “Coal

Miner’s Daughter” and, more re-

cently, “Me and Patsy Kickin’ Up

Dust: My Friendship With Patsy

Cline” (Grand Central).

FROM LEFT: COAL MINER’S DAUGHTER MUSEUM; DAVID MCCLISTER; JUDY MOCK/COUNTRY MUSIC HALL OF FAME AND MUSEUM

Best Cline

stage tip? Look

the audience in

the eyes the en-

tire time, and talk

to them.

How did you hear of her fatal

plane crash? On the radio, when I

was still in bed that Sunday morn-

ing in ’63. I’m still in shock.

How close were you two? She was

the greatest friend. She was the big

sister I never had.

Loretta Lynn in Nashville in 2017, above, and, left, at age 9.

   



     



        

    

 

 

      

    

  

 

 

    

     



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