Aug. 2 (UPI) -- Singer Jeannie Seely, who helped transform the image of women in country music, has died. She was 85. Seely died Friday in a hospice in the Nashville area, the Country Music Association said, and her publicist, Don Murray Grubbs told told The Tennessean that she died after an intestinal infection.

We had many wonderful laughs together, cried over certain things together, and she will be missed,” Dolly Parton wrote.

She blazed a trail for women in country music with the candor of her songs and her bold fashion sense. She was the first woman to host a segment on the Opry.