Childhood and Early Adulthood
Born to Melvin "Ted" Webb (April 9, 1906 - February 23, 1959) and Clara Marie (née Ramey) Webb (May 5, 1912 - November 24, 1981) and named for film star Loretta Young, Loretta was the second of eight children. Three of her siblings also pursued country careers — her youngest sister, Crystal Gayle, sister Peggy Sue, and Jay Lee Webb. On her mother's side, she is related to country singer Patty Loveless (née Patricia Ramey), as well as Venus Ramey (Miss America, 1944). She was raised in Butcher Hollow, part of Van Lear, Kentucky, a mining community near Paintsville. Her mother was of Scots-Irish and Cherokee ancestry. Her father was a coalminer, storekeeper, and farmer. Her 8 siblings are Melvin Webb. Jr(b.1929-d.1993), Herman (b.1934), Jay Lee (b.1939), Donald (b.1943), Peggy Webb Wright (b.1947), Betty Ruth (b.1949) and Brenda Gail Webb (b.1951).
She married Oliver Vanetta Lynn, commonly known as "Doolittle", "Doo" or "Mooney" (for running moonshine), on January 10, 1948. Oliver was 21 years old; Loretta, born in 1932 according to Kentucky Birth Records, was 14 years old. In an effort to break free of the coal mining industry, the couple moved to the logging community of Custer, Washington. The Lynns had six children:
- Betty Sue, (1948-08-03) August 3, 1948 (age 64)
- Clara Marie (Cissy), (1951-03-04) March 4, 1951 (age 61)
- Jack Benny, (1954-06-04)June 4, 1954 – July 22, 1984(1984-07-22) (aged 30)
- Ernest Ray, (1959-04-12) April 12, 1959 (age 53)
- Peggy and Patsy (twins; latter named for Patsy Cline), (1964-06-03) June 3, 1964 (age 48)
Before her marriage, Loretta regularly sang at churches and in local concerts. After she married, she stopped singing in public, focusing on family life. Instead, she passed her love of music on to her children, often singing to them around the house. When she was 21 years old, her husband bought her a $17.00 Harmony guitar as an anniversary present, which she taught herself to play.
Although married for almost fifty years, with six children, the Lynns' marriage was reportedly rocky up to Doolittle's death in 1996. In her 2002 autobiography, Still Woman Enough, and in an interview with CBS News the same year, Lynn recounts how her husband cheated on her regularly and once left her while she was giving birth. Lynn and her husband fought frequently, but, she said, "he never hit me one time that I didn't hit him back twice".
Read more about this topic: Loretta Lynn
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