Dolly Parton has built an empire on truth-telling wrapped in rhinestones and wit sharper than a fiddle string. But peel back the sequins, and you’ll find a girl from the Smoky Mountains who fell hard for the Man in Black long before she penned “Jolene” or dazzled Hollywood. In a moment that’s equal parts sassy showdown and heartfelt homage, Parton once looked June Carter Cash square in the eye and declared, “I had him first. I loved him before you did.” It was a line delivered with Dolly’s trademark blend of humor and honesty – a playful jab at one of country’s most iconic power couples, rooted in a teenage crush that lit up the Grand Ole Opry stage like a firecracker on the Fourth of July.

The story kicks off in 1959, a time when Elvis was shaking hips on the Ed Sullivan Show and rock ‘n’ roll was stealing country’s thunder. Dolly Parton, all of 13 years old and fresh off the bus from Sevierville, Tennessee, stepped onto the sacred wooden planks of Nashville’s Ryman Auditorium for her Grand Ole Opry debut. She was a pint-sized powerhouse, strumming her guitar and belting out tunes with a voice that belied her age. The crowd ate it up – three encores, standing ovations, the works. But it wasn’t the applause that stole young Dolly’s heart that night. It was the man who introduced her: Johnny Cash, 32, brooding and magnetic, already the outlaw poet in black with a baritone that could rattle the rafters.

“I remember it like it was yesterday,” Parton later reflected in interviews, her blue eyes twinkling with the memory. Cash, fresh off hits like “Folsom Prison Blues” and nursing his own demons with pills and prison-yard charisma, spotted the kid backstage and insisted on giving her the spotlight. He strode out, mic in hand, and boomed to the packed house: “Ladies and gentlemen, get ready for a voice that’s gonna knock you flat – Miss Dolly Parton!” As she took the stage, Dolly felt something shift inside her – a rush that wasn’t just nerves. “That was the first grown person I had that with,” she confessed decades later. “I had little crushes on boyfriends, but that’s when my hormones were beginning to rage, and I just felt all those feelings for him because he was very charismatic.”

Butterflies? Check. Shivers down the spine? Absolutely. For a hormone-fueled teen raised on gospel quartets and moonshine tales, Cash was a walking revelation – tall, dark, and dangerous in a world of pompadours and polyester suits. He wasn’t just a star; he was sex appeal incarnate, the kind that made a girl’s knees buckle and her dreams turn feverish. Dolly’s family hustled her back home after the show, but that spark lingered like smoke from a bonfire. It fueled her drive, whispering that if she could make Johnny Cash notice her, she could conquer Nashville’s Music Row on her own terms.

Fast-forward through the swinging ’60s and into the ’70s, and Dolly’s no longer the wide-eyed waif. She’s a chart-topping force, duetting with Porter Wagoner on steamy hits like “Just Someone I Used to Know” and turning heads with her gravity-defying curves and razor-sharp songcraft. But the Cash crush? It simmered quietly, a private ember in her tell-all tales. Johnny and June, meanwhile, were country’s ultimate love story – a whirlwind romance born in the ’60s that culminated in a 1968 wedding officiated by a whooping crowd of fans. They tamed each other’s wild sides, co-writing “If I Were a Carpenter” and raising a blended family amid the highs of “Ring of Fire” and the lows of addiction battles. June was the steel magnolia to Johnny’s rebel yell, the woman who dragged him to rehab and back to the stage.

It was against this backdrop of mutual respect – two queens of country orbiting the same black-clad king – that Dolly dropped her bombshell. The exact year is fuzzy in the retellings, lost to the haze of backstage chats and post-show whiskeys, but it happened sometime in the late ’70s or early ’80s, during one of those Nashville nights where legends mingled like old flames at a reunion. Picture it: a dimly lit green room at the Opry or a quiet corner at Tootsie’s Orchid Lounge, the air thick with cigarette haze and the faint twang of steel guitars from the alley. June, elegant in her pearls and pantsuit, sips her tea; Dolly, blonde and bold in a dress that hugs like a second skin, leans in with that Parton grin.

“I had him first,” Dolly quipped, her Tennessee drawl dripping with mischief. “I loved him before you did.” June, ever the class act with a laugh like church bells, didn’t flinch. She threw her head back and chuckled, knowing full well the harmless truth in it. It wasn’t a catfight or a claim-staking; it was Dolly being Dolly – owning her girlhood swoon without apology, turning a private pang into public poetry. June got it; hell, she probably admired it. After all, Johnny’s charisma had reeled in half of Music City at one point or another. But for Dolly, it was cathartic, a way to honor the man who lit her fuse without stepping on June’s toes.

The anecdote bubbled up publicly in fits and starts over the years, but it hit prime time in 1997. Johnny Cash, gaunt but grinning at 65, was guesting on Ralph Emery’s Nashville Now to plug his autobiography Cash: The Autobiography. Emery, the silver-haired king of late-night country talk, couldn’t resist pulling out a tape of Dolly’s old confession. As the clip rolled – Dolly gushing about those teenage tingles and Cash’s “spark” that set her world ablaze – the studio audience held its breath. What would the Man in Black say? Would he blush? Dodge? Nah. Johnny leaned into the mic, his voice a gravelly rumble of humility: “I really appreciate that. That was nice of her.”

Classic Cash – unflappable, gracious, turning potential awkwardness into a warm nod across the decades. He didn’t dwell; instead, he pivoted to tales of his own Opry glory days, but the moment stuck. Fans clipped it for YouTube immortality, where it racks up views from Gen Z kids discovering country’s roots alongside boomers reliving the glory. It’s a snapshot of the era’s tangled affections: no jealousy, just joy in shared history. Dolly, watching from her Dollywood empire, must’ve smiled – her bold words immortalized, her crush validated by the man himself.

Why does this tale endure in 2025, as Nashville chases TikTok trends and AI anthems? Because it’s the human heartbeat of country music – raw, real, and unfiltered. Dolly’s confession isn’t about possession; it’s about inspiration. Johnny Cash didn’t just introduce a 13-year-old to the stage; he introduced her to possibility. That night in ’59 planted seeds for “Coat of Many Colors,” “9 to 5,” and a legacy that’s sold 100 million records worldwide. Without that hormonal hailstorm, who knows if Dolly would’ve fought her way out of the holler?

June Carter Cash, who passed in 2003, would’ve turned 96 this year – a fitting milestone to revisit her easy rapport with Dolly. The two women, both survivors of the boys’ club that was ’70s country, shared a bond forged in fire. June coaxed Johnny sober; Dolly outgrew Porter’s controlling shadow. Their “rivalry” over Cash? A footnote, a funhouse mirror to the real battles they won together. As Dolly told The Boot in a 2010 sit-down: “June was a class act. She knew I was just a kid with stars in my eyes. And Johnny? He was the spark that lit the fire.”

Today, with biopics like Walk the Line and Jolene in the works, this story adds flavor to the folklore. It’s fodder for fan forums, where threads debate “Who had the bigger crush on JC?” and playlists mash “Ring of Fire” with “Here You Come Again.” But strip away the nostalgia, and it’s a reminder: Country’s queens don’t claw; they crown each other. Dolly’s line to June wasn’t holding back – it was holding on, to a memory that made her the icon she is.

In a genre that’s seen its share of scandals and splits, Dolly Parton’s “I had him first” stands as a love letter to first loves – the ones that don’t last but light the way. Johnny Cash might’ve been her teenage dream, but he was June’s forever. And Dolly? She got the last laugh, turning butterflies into a billion-dollar brand. That’s country for you: where a little crush goes a long, honky-tonkin’ way.