Dolly Parton says her father, Lee Parton, had an enduring impact on her life.

Marie Claire's digital cover star Dolly Parton (opens in new tab) is as famous for her charity work as she is for her music, and in an interview with RuPaul, she revealed that her father, Lee Parton, inspired one of her most famous charities, the " Imagination Library (opens in new tab), and revealed that he was the inspiration for one of her most famous charities, "Imagination Library.

"'Imagination Library' is one of the proudest things I've done since I started in this business," Parton told RuPaul.

"My father, and many of my relatives, many people in this country [where I come from], especially my father, because he couldn't read or write. [My father] was embarrassed about it and thought it was too difficult to learn as an adult," she continued. 'I felt sorry for my father because he was very smart. I thought if my father had an education, I don't know what I could have done for him."

[4 [But] I remember from the bottom of my heart, I wanted to do something. Start a program. With my father's help. 'So I started a little program in my home county, Sevier County in East Tennessee. I need your help. We give books to children. Once a month, from the time they're born until they go to school, we're going to mail them a little book with their name on it."

"So we started a little program, and it really worked. And we were hoping that this program would be implemented in counties, or just a few counties." But the governor at the time, Phil Bredesen, was a wonderful man. This is a great program. So we did. And the next thing you know, we were in Canada, and now we're all over the world, in different parts of the world. So we gave away 150 million books. My father lived long enough to see it work."

"I am so proud to be able to get books into the hands of that many children. Hopefully, it will last forever," Parton recalled.

"And I will always think of my father and always feel proud that I got to share that with him."