The text of Dolly's acceptance speech as she was inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame on the Sept. 22, 1999, live telecast of the Country Music Association Awards on CBS:

Dolly was introduced by Kenny Rogers, and after a montage clip presentation of her career, she came on stage to a thunderous standing ovation. She performed "Train, Train" and received a second standing ovation at its end as Kenny came back and presented her with the Hall of Fame plaque, which she asked him to hold as the ovation continued and she began to speak with her eyes tearing.

I want to, ah, thank all of you. I have a lot of people that I need to thank tonight. Thank you, God bless you.

(applause begins to soften, and the audience begins to sit)

You know a friend of mine, Mac Davis, once wrote a song called "Lord, Let Me Die Knowin' My People Were Proud of Me."

(applause ends)

And I know that my mama and daddy are up there in Sevierville watching right now, and I know I have a lot of my family here. In fact, my beautiful sister Rachel and my handsome brother Randy are somewhere. I can't see them. But they're somewhere here representing the family 'cause we couldn't; there they are way back there! There, hi!

Anyway, uh, I want to thank everybody that's ever played a part in my career. And there's so many I couldn't possibly mention them, but there's a few people that I really need to thank special. Of course I did on the little clips that they showed, Porter Wagoner's played a big part in my life. And Porter couldn't be here tonight, but, uh, I want to thank him. I know he's out there watching 'cause it was because of him that I had all those great RCA records back in the early days and all our duets and a lot of wonderful things happened to me because he gave me that first big break.

And, course, uh, in Porter's seat there's a man that's been a big, big part of my life. He managed Porter Wagoner during all the years that Porter was managing me, and he's still with me today because, um. Don Warden and his wife, Ann. They've just been a great; I think they're sitting back there, so Don I wanted to personally thank you, too, for helping me out through the years.

(applause)

You and my friend Judy Ogle have kinda kept me sane while all this was going on. And, of course, my Uncle Bill Owens who saw something in me way back early on when I was a kid and thought that we could do something with it. And without my Uncle Bill I would never have met Cas Walker and Dorothy Gable and Ed Schuller and Fred Foster, Buddy Killen, Porter and all these other folks. So I just want to thank them especially.

I owe a lot of folks a lot of thanks, but I give the praise and honor to God for whatever talent and good luck that I've had.

(applause)

So thank you so much and Sandy Gallin and Jim Morey and everybody else who's ever helped me out. Thank you.

(applause and shouts)

God bless you.