Stepping forward with Dolly

September 3, 2026 · 0 Comments

by BROCK WEIR

I didn’t know what to expect when I was called to Newmarket’s Margaret Bahen Hospice three years ago last month.

The call didn’t come from a family member or immediate loved one, but rather on behalf of a man I considered a friend.

Gordon Barnes was a very active member of the Aurora community who found many ways to serve the community he loved, and give back to it as well, in ways large and small.

He and his wife Marie could often be found at the local farmers market on Saturday mornings where, hand-in-hand, and later, as time began getting the better of them, hand-on-walker, quietly distributing homemade barley sugar lollipops they made in antique molds salvaged from an earlier incarnation of Laura Secord.

They were each instrumental in furthering their creative interests and building vibrant communities around them, while Gordon created a lasting legacy locally by serving on committees ranging from environment to active transportation, all the while remaining an active voice on the topics from the sidelines when taking a term off from the committees.

Our professional paths crossed many times over the years, but this one was different.

Terminally ill, the Minnesota-born Barnes had one final message for the community he helped shape – the importance for people who are here today to ensure the citizens of tomorrow have the best possible start in life.

As it happened, one of the key ways people could do just that, he believed, was to join singer, actress, business tycoon, and all-around global icon Dolly Parton on her own mission to give kids the foundations they need to be all they can be.

Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library is a free book-gifting program on both sides of the United States-Canada border, “devoted to inspiring a love of reading in young children. Through the program, enrolled youngsters can receive a monthly high-quality, age-appropriate book in the mail, free of charge.

She expanded her eponymous Imagination Library into Canada in 2006.

Since its establishment on our side of the border 20 years ago this year, they have now distributed more than five million books across the country through scores of partners at the community level.

“Before he passed away, my Daddy told me the Imagination Library was probably the most important thing that I had ever done,” said Parton at the time of its foundation in Canada. “I can’t tell you how much that meant to me because I created the Imagination Library as a tribute to my Daddy. He was the smartest man I have ever known but I know in my heart his inability to read probably kept him from fulfilling all of his dreams.

“Inspiring kids to love to read became my mission. In the beginning, my hope was simply to inspire the children in my home country, but here we are today with a worldwide program that gives a book a month to well over three million children.

“Of course, I have not done this alone. The real heroes of our story are the thousands of local organizations who have embraced my dream and made it their own. They raise millions of dollars each year and wake up every day with a passion to make sure their kids have every opportunity to succeed.

“It’s been quite a journey but we still have so much more left to do… Let’s share this dream that all children should grow up in a home full of books. The first step is always the hardest, but you’ll never know unless you try.”

While the local organizations who are making all this possible are indeed heroes who are doing the heavy lifting, the message Parton shared through her Imagination Library is, I think we can all agree, a classic example of her trademark understatement – in everything but her classic look.

Since Parton’s sudden passing on August 25 – and I say sudden as, despite how transparent she was about her illness in recent months, it seems almost unfathomable for such a bright, larger-than-life light to be extinguished – it is clear that just about everyone was touched or impacted by her in some way.

Countless people around the world were, of course, impacted by her beautiful voice and her storytelling songbook – to offer just one personal anecdote to illustrate this point, when I worked abroad in East Africa in 2007, the newsroom came to a halt every time a song from Dolly Parton, Kenny Rogers (or both!) came on the radio to allow for an office-wide singalong.

Others gravitated less towards Dolly the singer, and more towards her output on film – 9 To 5, Steel Magnolias, The Best Little Whorehouse in Texas, and more – and television, as well as streaming. The bonus being that that voice followed her in whatever she tried her hand.

A friend of mine shared in the days following her death how, as a young boy who had moved to North America from Italy when he was little over 10, overwhelmed with the culture shock of being in a new school, with new people, immersed in an unfamiliar language, he found something of a safe harbour in the flashy lady he saw on TV.

Another friend, a trans woman, found acceptance in the person of Dolly Parton when, in her world, there was precious little acceptance to go around.

Another reminiscence that struck me was from a parent whose child was distraught by the news – not necessarily being a fan of Parton the entertainer, but rather simply in her role as “the lady who sent me books.”

Dolly Parton, despite her self-deprecation, proved the old adage that not all superheroes wore capes. Above and beyond her boundless talent and international work for literacy, she supported countless charities in ways large, small, and unheralded; invested much of the money she made to support communities and marginalized populations in need; and perhaps most importantly and effortlessly served as a living, tangible representation of what simply what it means to be a good person.

It might sound simple on the surface, but in today’s present world where so many of those individuals who have amassed great wealth are more inclined to use it to amass power, profile, and pursue even more treasure for their coffers, it is a potent reminder the difference each of us can make if motivated to do so.

Few of us have the resources at our fingertips to make as profound a difference on the world around us as Dolly Parton did, but, as her story so powerfully illustrates, no matter how humble our beginnings, and, for that matter, no matter how humble our presents, all it really takes is a good heart and taking that first step.

We would all do well to remember her belief of “the first step is always the hardest, but you’ll never know unless you try,” or even the advice she gave to listeners as radio psychologist Shirlee Kenyon in the 1992 film Straight Talk: “Sometimes you’ve got to just honk your horn. If you don’t, nobody’s gonna know you’re coming.”