Fargo left Mount Airy after high school, and graduated from High Point College. She was a school teacher for several years before hitting it big as a country star in 1972.

"The Happiest Girl in the Whole U.S.A." not only topped the Country charts, it also climbed to #11 on the Billboard pop chart. Her second single, "Funny Face," hit number #1 in the country market and climbed to #5 pop. Fargo's hits included "Superman," "You Can't Be A Beacon (If Your Light Don't Shine)," "Don't Be Angry," and a song written for her late mother, "You Were Always There." According to Billboard's totals, she ranked with Loretta Lynn, Dolly Parton, Tammy Wynette, and Lynn Anderson as one of the top five country female vocalists of the 1970's on the Billboard charts. Donna Fargo chalked up 7 number one records and 25 top 40 country hits in Billboard, most of them songs she had written. She was given her own television variety show, The Donna Fargo Show, in 1978, and later guest-starring in the 1980s on television shows such as The Dukes of Hazzard and Hee Haw.

Fargo announced in 1978 that she had multiple sclerosis. It seemed to have little affect on her career initially and she was still highly active performing and recording into the early 1980's. In 1986 she signed with Mercury Records and had some modest success including a duet with Billy Joe Royal. Donna Fargo has only been occasionally active in the music business since the early 1990's but since that period has established a successful line of greeting cards and has authored several collections of poetry and inspirational prose.