Jewel Fay “Sammi” Smith, the singer of the country and pop hit “Help Me Make It Through the Night,” died Saturday after being transported to an Oklahoma City hospital. Smith was 61, and had been ill, her family said.

Smith won a Grammy award in 1971 for “Help Me Make It Through the Night,” written by Kris Kristofferson.

The song helped establish Mr. Kristofferson as a leading Nashville songwriter, and was voted single of the year by the Country Music Association in 1971.

She said in a 1981 Associated Press interview, the song “definitely brought me prestige and no small amount of satisfaction. And it’s paid for a few meals.”

She had other hits with “Then You Walk In” in 1971 and “Today I Started Loving You Again” in 1975.

She performed in the mid-1970s with old friends Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings.

Her last charted record was in 1980, “Love Me All Over,” for the independent Step One label.

Smith, who was born in Orange County, Calif., in 1943, dropped out of school at 11 to pursue her career in country music. She would sing in various nightclubs, amazing audiences with her talent.

She married at age 15, had three children, was divorced, and began pursuing her music career in earnest.

She produced her first hit “So Long Charlie Brown” in 1967. Six years later, she moved to Dallas, where she joined the “Outlaw Movement” with Willie Nelson and Waylon Jennings.

Smith also found time to celebrate her Apache heritage. She was a frequent visitor to an Apache reservation in Arizona, where she would make pottery and jewelry.