How Old Was Loretta Lynn When She Got Married?

Loretta Lynn married Oliver “Doolittle” Lynn when she was 15 and he was 21. They had only met a month before.

Loretta gave birth to the first of their six children a year later, and by the time she was 20, she had three more. They were married until Doolittle died in 1996.

The couple’s marriage, which began when he was 21 and she was 15, has been described as “one of the great legends of the twentieth century” and “one of the most compelling tales in American popular culture” by historians and music scholars.

Lynn’s songwriting would be influenced by the happiness and heartbreak of her early marriage.

Still Woman Enough, her 2002 autobiography, and an interview with CBS News the same year, she detailed how her husband cheated on her regularly and once left her while she was giving birth.