Tammy Wynette: The First Lady of Country

This heart-warming episode, "Tammy Wynette: The First Lady of Country Music," centering upon the life and career of the lovely and talented Virginia Wynette Pugh (premiering on April 30, 1998) begins with her impoverished childhood, with her 1942 birth, in Itawamba County, Mississippi (near the Alabama border).

An only child of Mildred Faye Russell and William Hollice Pugh, who passes at a young age, when Wynette is merely eight months old, the baby is sent to stay with her maternal grandparents on their farm, on the state line.

Young Wynette learns accordion, guitar and piano, and singing Gospel, after working the fields by day, and listens to Country records, often playing them repeatedly. From here....

* 1959, Wynette marries at age 16, takes up housekeeping in a dilapidated shack, with no electricity nor running water, and welcomes three daughters.

* 1963, she attends beauty school in Tupelo, Mississippi, becoming a hairdresser. She renews her cosmetology license every year for the rest of her life, in case it were necessary to supplement her income.

* 1965, after her third baby develops Spinal Meningitis, the recently-divorced Wynette attempts to pay medical bills, by performing in clubs by night, and debuts on "Country Boy Eddie Show" on WBRC-TV in Birmingham, Alabama.

* 1966, Wynette relocates with her three daughters to Nashville, Tennessee, where she attempts a recording contract and auditions for Producer Billy Sherrill, but he reluctant to sign her, as Country radio stations hesitate to play records by female singers at this point. But when Sherrill hears Wynette's performance of "Apartment No. 9," he signs her and changes her name to Tammy Wynette.

* 1967, Tammy often drives her tour bus during lean times, and when her back-up band walks off the stage during one of her performances, Country star George Jones lends Tammy the use of his band. They soon duet and marry, becoming the First Couple of Country Music.

* 1968, Tammy tops the Country charts with "D-I-V-O-R-C-E," in the aftermath of her second divorce, with Don Chapel, beginning a sting of #1 hits.

* Later this year, Tammy scores with the biggest hit Country single by a female, "Stand by Your Man," of which she says "I spent twenty minutes writing the song, and twenty years defending it" to male-bashing feminists who miss its points of determination, resolve, peacemaking and forgiveness.

* Tammy and George's marriage proves rocky because of his drinking and verbal abuse, but Tammy although the marriage is stormy, sacrifices her health and happiness so as not to disappoint her many fans.

* 1975, after her third divorce, more setbacks begin to pour in with several health problems. Tammy also receives a series of threatening calls and is terrorized by a perpetrator who stalks her and sets fire to her residence.

* 1978, after her fourth divorce, Tammy is badly beaten and kidnapped from a Nashville shopping center. No one is charged with the crimes.

* Later this year she marries singer/songwriter/manager George Richey, whom she credits for bringing happiness into her life finally, for this well-deserving star, whom many credit for bringing class to Country music.

* While the 1980's "couldn't come fast enough" for Tammy, her world begins to crumble once again, as a bank into which she and Richey invest collapses, and they lose most of their belongings when the government forces them into bankruptcy.

* Country radio stations are also undergoing new phases and overlook Tammy's music for new acts. Tammy, therefore, reinvents herself, by recording in various duets, trios and other collaborations.

* 1992, a famous feud erupts between the First Lady of Country and the First Lady of the country, when Hillary Clinton tells reporters that she does not respond to Bill's sex scandals as Tammy Wynette would "Stand by her Man."

Tammy's marriages are with Euple Byrd (1959–66), Don Chapel (1967–68), George Jones (1969–75), Michael Tomlin (1976), and George Richey (1978–98). With Byrd, she welcomes daughters Gwen, Jackie and Tina. With Jones, she welcomes daughter Tamala plus step-children, Susan, Jeffrey and Bryan.

(Stephen Kingsley appears to be credited as episode Narrator, but the long list of credits squeezes into condensed split-screen in split-second timing, and are extremely difficult to decipher. The narrator does, however, sound like "American Country Countdown's" Bob Kingsley.)

Interview Guests for this episode consist of Entertainers Emmylou Harris, Loretta Lynn, Kathy Mattea, Dolly Parton, Pam Tillis and Tanya Tucker, Joan Dew (Biographer), Barry McCloud (Author/Historian), and Robert K. Oermann (Author/Historian).

Archive footage includes Tammy Wynette in Interviews from August 1996 and October 1997, as well as several of her (unidentified) television appearances, some with George Jones in performances.