08/26/2026
Dolly Parton’s legacy will live on in so many ways, including in the hands of children who discover a love of reading through her Imagination Library.
Each year, Tri-County Electric Cooperative is proud to support our local Imagination Library through the United Way of South Central Illinois by donating a portion of the proceeds from our Mascot Pecan sales. It’s a small part of an incredible program that has placed millions of books into the homes of children and made a lasting difference in communities like ours.
We’re grateful to play a small role in carrying forward a legacy built on generosity, opportunity and a love for others.
Thank you, Dolly, for dreaming big—and for giving so many children the chance to do the same. ❤️
Today, our hearts are broken.
Dolly Parton was one of the world’s great storytellers. She told stories through the songs she wrote, through the unmistakable voice that sang them, and through the way she lived her life.
But some of the most important stories Dolly ever helped tell began with a child opening a book.
Dolly often spoke about creating the Dolly Parton Imagination Library in honor of her father, Robert Lee Parton. Her dad could not read or write, but Dolly described him as one of the smartest people she had ever known. She understood firsthand that a lack of literacy has nothing to do with a person’s intelligence or worth—and she wanted children everywhere to have opportunities her father never had.
That love for her dad became something extraordinary.
The Imagination Library grew into far more than a literacy program. It became Dolly’s promise that every child—no matter where they lived, how much money their family had, or what circumstances they were born into—deserved to grow up surrounded by books, imagination and possibility.
United Way of South Central Illinois has been incredibly proud to carry a small piece of that promise forward in our own communities.
Through our partnership with Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library, 95,497 books have already made their way into the homes and hands of children across our region.
42,821 in Jefferson County.
35,315 in Marion County.
17,201 in Washington County.
And now, thanks to our partnership with ROE #13, children in Clinton County are receiving those special books in their mailboxes, too. The first 160 books have already begun another chapter of Dolly’s story here in South Central Illinois.
It is difficult to put into words what it means to lose someone whose work has touched so many families—especially when we get to see that impact firsthand every single month.
There will never be another Dolly.
But there will be children curled up beside their parents asking, “Will you read it again?”
There will be preschoolers running to the mailbox because they know a book might be waiting for them.
There will be children who discover that they love to read. Children who enter kindergarten knowing the joy of a story. Children who someday grow up to write stories of their own.
And somewhere in all of that is the legacy of a daughter who loved her dad enough to make sure millions of children had the opportunity to learn to read.
That may be one of the greatest stories Dolly Parton ever told.
Today, we mourn with millions of people around the world. And here at United Way of South Central Illinois, we also simply say:
Thank you, Dolly.
Thank you for the music.
Thank you for the stories.
Thank you for honoring your dad in a way that changed childhoods around the world.
And thank you for believing so fiercely in our children.
We will keep turning the pages. ❤️📚
