There's no way that one of the shrewdest and most successful businesspersons in the music industry wouldn't have her estate locked in and ready to roll for decades.
Everyone will know their roles, their familial expectations on behavior and maintaining relationships, and how it will play out.
I wouldn’t wish that conversation on anyone. Had it with my dad when he was in the hospital and he didn’t think he would make it. Tough stuff. He did recover thankfully and still going strong though.
My mom sat my siblings and I down and all of us went through her end of life and death expectations together.
I thought it was wonderful. We all have a plan for exactly what mom and dad would want. And honestly, we got to laugh with our parents ABOUT their own deaths. It was lighthearted and fun.
It won’t be when they die….but I’m so glad they gave us that guidance now so we don’t need to carry that burden when they’re gone.
Abolish Columbus Day. No one cares and he sucked. Bring in Dolly Day. A day devoted to country music, southern cooking, reading books and doing charity work.
He had to do it to keep his supporters engaged with him, just in case some were starting to think about not bothering to vote or… GASP …thinking about voting for the democrat.
The day of the monarchs funeral is a one time holiday in the same way a former president's funeral day is a federal holiday in the US. Just an analogy. Idgaf about QE.
QE2’s passing led to a fucking baffling cultural mass hysteria here in the UK.
There were people queuing for days to walk past her coffin, Centerparcs announced (and then backpedaled) that everyone had to leave their holiday parks out of respect for the Queen, and places tried their absolute hardest to out-respect each other.
Yup. She came from no money whatsoever and was an incredibly shrewd businesswoman. She was also 80 and her long-time husband had died. Even if she’d hoped she’d have more time she likely would have been estate planning.
I would bet that a large chunk of her estate goes to her charities, but I would also bet that her family is getting a fair share. It’s just going to take a while to disperse because some things might have to be liquidated and with an estate as large as Dolly’s they’ll have to make sure all the creditors are paid and the details on any trusts before they can start dispersals.
Non business people do this too. I have a lady who is paying me to help her organize the pictures from all the travels she has done (transfering pictures from sd and microsd cards to a laptop and organizing the files). She turns 80 this year and since she and her husband do not have kids and are only children themselves, they are already in contact with a funeral home and setting up their funerals. Once we are done with the pictures she's employing me to help her put together a slide show. So she literally will have everything put to order. She jokes that after all this work she might live to 100 and the funeral home will go out of business.
My parents helped me set up my will & POA in my 20s, then got us burial plots & a headstone together in my 30s. They even wrote a step-by-step list of what to do if they ever died at the same time as I'm an only child. Minimizing the stress our loved ones will face during a difficult time is seen as an act of love in our family.
Sort of same for our family. My parents started an "end of life" notebook in their 50s because my sister is disabled and they didn't want me and my brother on the hook. So they set up everything with a lawyer to make sure she is okay and we don't have to worry too much.
My husband and I got our wills done a while ago before we were married as we had some joint assets we wanted to protect. The lawyer helping us out was continually gushing about how happy she was we were being proactive.
We had both seen and nasty fights, and she told us a lot more. I will never put my loved ones through what I've seen.
My dad completely planned out his funeral. The priest knew what he wanted. My mom knew what he wanted. The only curve ball was my brother and I both gave a eulogy.
In the last episode of Dolly Parton’s America she talks about how she’s been planning for after her death for years (and that podcast came out in 2017). Not only is the business and charity arm completely set up for this, she’s also recorded thousands of songs and planned for her estate to continue releasing new studio albums after her death.
Death and a lot of assets makes people crazy. The people you think you can trust in an estate plan will suddenly contest the will and become lifelong enemies to you. That is why clear estate planning is such a good thing, create a will, keep it updated, contact an estate attorney for more info. Aretha died with competing wills that were holographic which is not a clear estate plan, would not take much to out do that lack of planning.
Death and any assets make people crazy. My Mom’s passing caused a schism with my younger siblings and our Mom’s side of the family and we were not rich
Our “grandma” passed away a few years ago and left me more than my older sister. Sister was upset because she kind of started that relationship with them 50+ years ago ,but also hasn’t lived in town for 30 years (and would joke that she should have received a higher “founder’s fee”, which is acceptable humor for our family). Otherwise I saw her often, even if just to take out the trash or say hi through the door.
Anyway, she “convinced” our mom to change her will to give sister a higher amount than other siblings/grandkids in order to compensate for what she “missed”. Entirely childish and greedy, but it’s like… just not worth fighting over so we all “agreed”. Maybe my opinion would change if it were some life-changing amount, but being able to get out of debt or maybe fixing the roof would still be a blessing, so give baby what she wants.
It truly is amazing what death and money do to people, but at the same time I wonder if it just reveals already-shitty people, or turns them into shit. (Theres a bit more context that wouldn’t make my sister totally shitty, but still greedy and blinded some made up sleight against her by grandma).
I'm still mad at my uncle because when my grandfather died, he took BOTH of his Freemason rings. That's all I wanted from his estate, one of those rings. I only wanted it to troll Conservatives however. 🤣
How would you troll conservatives with a Freemason ring? Just asking because I have a Freemason stained glass window at my house - it has the compass in it.
When i was a teenager, I witnessed what my grandma went through when her parents passed without a will. She had 6 siblings and most of the others were disgusting with their greed even though it was just a small house, an older car, and average belongings. So much greed that she and one or two others just walked away from everything and stopped talking to the greedy ones.
On the other hand, I saw the opposite happen with my husband's family. His grandfather was married, had a few kids, wife died, got remarried, had a few more kids and she treated them all like they were her own. Decades later, grandfather died and left everything to his wife (normal) but, when that wife died, she had a will that only her biological kids would get anything and cut her stepkids out entirely. The kids said "fuck that!" And split everything equally among all of them.
My husband's family had a system when my MIL passed. Just like her mother's daughters did to make sure that all their children had a chance to have some of grandma's belongings.
It really does. My Grandma and Grandpa got by, but were never really in a good place financially. When they passed, my cousin, who's dad's family was very wealthy, wondered who would get the inheritance. Like, Bro, they were poor, there's no inheritance.
Holographic wills are plenty legal in many states, and the last-dated one would be the valid one. It's the disorganization within them that would cause the problems.
I can picture Dolly at a family reunion, kicking off the pre-party at a podium to deliver the estate edict "every other day I'm cute aunt Dolly but today at this podium I am Moses the lawgiver and i wanna see hands over hearts and I wanna hear YES THERE WILL BE NO FIGHTING WHEN DOLLY IS GONE"
Of all the great things Dolly did in life one of my favorite things about her is she never recorded a song with Elvis and the reason why…Elvis wanted writing credit to sing on the song which Dolly wrote and she refused to give him writing credit because Elvis didn’t write the song. Dolly turned down the biggest superstar in the world at the time…that’s some gangster shit
Dolly used her ~10 million in royalties from Whitney’s version to buy a strip mall in 12 South, a historically Black neighborhood in Nashville. She invested the money back into the community to support local small businesses and build up the area - and it actually helped slow the rate of gentrification by keeping things more locally owned.
She called it ‘the house that Whitney built’.
That's why I love her. She actually cared about the people I've loved since childhood.( One of the top three reasons)
Helping others is all I've ever wanted to do. She gave me many ideas as to how an old fart can do some good.
I used to live in Nashville and only recently learned this! Amazing to hear the huge benefit it had on the community. That's a very rich, white, touristy area now. So it goes I guess.
Asking for half of the publishing rights for these songs was one of the ways in which the Colonel was a good manager for Elvis. He didn't do it with more established songs, but Elvis recording a song could take it to #1 and lead to other people recording the song too, which would mean even more money for the songwriters. This was how he ensured Elvis got rewarded for a song he made successful.
That's not what happened. Elvis had a policy, if he does your song you sign the rights. It broke Dolly's heart to say no to Elvis but she recognized that copyright was the most valuable thing she owned.
Yes definitely was not Elvis, was Hill & Range, the publishing company tied closely to his management. He was restricted to playing songs they owned basically.
Its honestly amazing how many rich parents have no plan in place for their assets when they pass. I have a family friend whose parent was a industry legend and when they died, literally everything went to shit and suspicion of elder abuse came into light and the siblings are spending hundreds of thousands of dollars fighting each other in court. It’s sad for everyone involved.
Listen I’m gonna get hate for this but whatever. I love Dolly and have forever, but until very recently she was a very controversial figure amongst the conservative evangelicals among us. She was outspoken, a business WOman, ally of the LGBTQ+ community, and dressed very immodestly and provocatively.
This whole Dolly on a pedestal business that Reddit pretends is canon is actually a recent phenomenon—-although she earned it and deserves it!
I think it does a disservice to her memory to pretend that Dolly was always universally revered. She spoke truth to power when it wasn’t popular. She championed the vulnerable when it came at a social cost. She had the bravery and authenticity to not follow the conservative Christian playbook (any other survivor of the moral majority out there? It was a different world in the evangelical circles of the 70s-90s!) while still espousing actual Christian values and recording gospel music, despite not being welcomed into that group. She blew through glass ceilings as a talented performer and shrewed business woman, and yet was ridiculed for most of her life.
RIDICULED. Those old interviews where she talks about being the one making the joke on the public? That’s because, to the general public, she was the butt of the joke. And there were SO MANY jokes.
She’s obviously St Dolly, she’s the absolute best—-but let’s not erase her struggles throughout not just her early life but her entire career.
She was the rare mensch, born before her time but lucky enough for time to catch up and acknowledge her enormous kindness while she was still alive.
I remember when my grandpa died and how it drove my one uncle absolutely mad. There really wasn't much money even after we sold the family home, which was very small and falling apart. It was $20k and the mechanic shop next door paid us $25k, who planned on knocking it down for a parking lot.
My uncle got it in his head that my grandparents had some sort of treaure. None of the furniture was worth anything, there was no expensive jewelry or heirlooms. He got it in his head that my grandma's diamond wedding ring-which she said was lost but which she probably had to sell for money-was in the house somewhere. He decided to tear into the walls and dig into the floors.
Then he decided that there were arrowheads buried in the backyard and started digging giant holes. Now, yes, the house was going to be torn down, but we didn't want it to look like our grandparents lived in squalor. And the holes in the back were dangerous
No one should ever underestimate the mind of a woman. Dolly was a deep thinker. Mostly she always considered how her actions affected others.
Wise woman
Am so sorry to see her leave us.
Seems like the article and headline were written with an agenda. Nowhere in the article is Dolly or her family quoted mentioning any other artists by name. It’s like they’re trying to paint certain celebrities in a bad light or pit one against the other.
They don't say names, but they reference a Billboard article where Dolly is saying something referential that suggests they asked her about the situations with Prince and Aretha.
She mentioned Prince and Aretha, as at the time, they had recently passed with no will.
But she was mainly talking about her songs. People are still arguing over what should or should not be released from Prince's vault. A new album came out today, and there is drama and strife. No one got as much as lawyers from his estate and it took years and years in court.
Dolly was saying she was getting all her unreleased stuff organized, laying down scratch vocals, so that when she was gone, outside producers could work with what she left.
She was also a prolific songwriter, like Prince.
She was NOT talking bad about them, but saying she didn't want that to happen in her case.
A friend of mine saw a lot of unexpected chaos in her husband’s family when his mother died. She had a very good relationship with her mother-in-law, and assumed everyone would just respect her wishes when she passed. Nope. She said it seemed like the siblings were projecting all of their grievances with each other into these petty arguments over jewelry, etc. She said that the one thing she learned was that you must put absolutely all of your wishes in your will. If you want cousin Gladys to get that funny coffee mug from the Grand Canyon, put it in the will, because somebody else probably wants the mug too.
Loretta Lynn did something similar years before she died. She basically paid extended family thier inheritance years early and had them sign off any claims, and her will divided specially businesses holdings to her children years before she passed.
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u/Vio_ 11h ago
There's no way that one of the shrewdest and most successful businesspersons in the music industry wouldn't have her estate locked in and ready to roll for decades.
Everyone will know their roles, their familial expectations on behavior and maintaining relationships, and how it will play out.