Description: "Sarah Colley Cannon, better known as her stage character, Minnie Pearl, was born in Hickman County, Tennessee, in 1912. After graduating from Ward-Belmont, now Belmont University, she joined a touring theater company and produced and directed plays and musicals throughout the Southeast. In 1940 an executive for WSM radio in Nashville saw her Minni Pearl character and invited her to appear on the Grand Ole Opry. Cannon would play Minnie Pearl on both the Opry stage and the television show Hee Haw for the next fifty years"-- Provided by publisher.
Brief description:
Mary Ellen Pethel is an associate professor and academic leader at Belmont University, where she directs key interdisciplinary and global initiatives--including the Belmont Global Honors Program, University You with Metro Nashville Public Schools, the Fisk-Belmont Social Justice Collaborative, and the Summer Exchange Institute with Queen's University Belfast. An award-winning author of six books on education, women, and sports, her most recent work is Title IX, Pat Summitt, and Tennessee's Trailblazers. As a public historian, she served as a consultant and cast member for the documentary Facing the Laughter: Minnie Pearl. Pethel also leads Nashville Sites as executive director and is an archivist at Harpeth Hall School.
Review Quotes:
"Minnie Pearl became my friend in 1964. I was 18, new in town, and Minnie Pearl took me under her wing. She gave me good advice, the how to's, the how not to's, the when to's, and the when not to's. I learned a lot from her as a woman and as a professional entertainer but above all that, as a good, solid human being. Minnie was more than a big laugh. She was a big heart, and I will always love her."--Dolly Parton