Paul B Parker

LtCol Paul B. Parker, U.S. Air Force (retired), passed peacefully in the presence of family and the dedicated staff of Celia’s House on December 23, 2018 in Medford, Oregon. He was 96.

Service. Family. Humility.

Born December 22, 1922 in Creswell, Oregon, or as he was fond of saying “the booming downtown Metropolis of Creswell” (Population 5,031 as of 2010) to Robert I. Parker (1885-1940) and Dora J (Blythe) Parker (1886-1968), he grew up the son of a Methodist preacher and lived in several places in the Pacific Northwest; an area he was proud to call home. He was predeceased by his older sister Irene N Parker (Brown) (1916-2007) and brother Robert J Parker (1920-1923). He had many favorite memories growing up and made friends easily as a result of constant moving for Dad’s work.

He got his first dog “Toughie” from his Father’s friend and carried him home in his jacket on his bike. He was industrious and hard working. He caught salmon in Nehalem for a local fisherman, delivered groceries for the local store, including by boat when the river flooded the main street of the town, and harvested chittem bark from the local forests as a young boy. While in High School in Drain, Oregon (population 1,151 as of 2010) he worked in the sawmill and at a local filling station. Athletic and inclined to sports and in a school that was small, he played all the major sports: baseball, basketball and football.

He traded an electric motor for his first car, an old Model T that he worked on; a tinkering habit that continued throughout his long and storied life. He loved to take things apart; sometimes they’d get put back together. He drove friends to the ice cream stand at Rice Hill (a drive-in still exists at that spot today that serves his favorite ice cream and was always a regular stop; strawberry was his favorite). To his final week he would tell stories of driving that Model T up the hill past the ice cream store, one day having to back up the hill because the fuel tank was in the rear of the car and the fuel was gravity fed. He was always creative.

He was fascinated by flight and got his first airplane ride as a young man from a local businessman who owned a plane. It was a seminal moment in a young man’s life that would ignite a passion and drive him for decades. He carried on a family tradition of reading the “funny papers” first from the newspaper, an indication of a wry sense of humor. He also carried on the tradition of his father who listened to the Mormon Tabernacle Choir every Sunday, though he didn’t have to sprint to the Methodist church afterwards to preach like his father did.

His father died while he was still in High School in 1940. He stayed in Drain, living with his mother and her mother after High School graduation in 1941 and continued work at the filling station as well as playing minor league baseball for the Drain Black Sox as an outfielder. After church on December 7, 1941 he was with his Mom outside the church when some men drove up honking their horns and yelling “The Japs have bombed Pearl Harbor!” His first thought was “where the hell is Pearl Harbor?” He quickly figured it out and with the abdicating consent of his widowed mother, who would then be sending her only son off to war and living alone, he joined the Army Air Corps as an aviation cadet just days later at the age of 19. At one point in his training, he was conducting a cross-county training flight and got to visit his home town. It was a thrill to fly and do a barrel roll in front of his Mom and the teacher who had most influenced him. Mom and teacher were standing together when he did the maneuver and his mother exclaimed “he’s upside down!” to which the teacher gently said “he knows what he’s doing.” Both, as it turns out, were right. By 1943 he had his wings as a fighter pilot and a series of events took him to the Pacific flying fighter planes (P-47N) until his final combat sortie that had him over Tokyo the day the Japanese surrendered. He rarely talked about his days in the war until much later in life, and then mostly only with other pilots. He would argue and protest that he was not a “hero” for what he did, but he was always a hero to his family and friends.

While in the service, he had his gallbladder removed. This was in the 1940s and surgery was not as precise or sophisticated as it is today. During the operation, he had an out of body experience and “saw the bright light.” He described seeing his family on the other side of a river telling him it was not time. Since that day, he was at peace and not anxious or afraid of dying.

After the war, he returned stateside and remained in the National Guard. He retrieved his prized 1940 Ford convertible and headed to the San Francisco Bay area. There he attended business school and worked briefly for Dun and Bradstreet (not a good fit for him) until he went back to the active duty forces, eventually retiring from the US Air Force in 1967 at Lowry Air Force Base in Denver, Colorado. While in San Francisco he met Mildred “Millie” Lucille Weatherbe (1922-2016), a teacher from Piedmont, California whom he married. They had a daughter, Debra Lee “Debbie” Parker (Earley), and a son, Robert Charles (Rob) Parker; he was very proud of both. Debbie and her husband Jim brought 2 grandchildren, Justin and Megan. Great grandchildren include Sierra, Conner, Averie and Lilith. He was a loving father, grandfather and great grandfather. While he did other jobs after retiring from the Air Force, none would fulfill him as much as his days of flying and teaching others how to be good pilots and citizens.

He loved a good joke, occasionally he would tell one of his own that was not cringe-worthy. Fun loving and gentle, he found companionship and camaraderie in service organizations with like-minded citizens who shared his sense of community.

Service and camaraderie were central themes throughout his life. After retiring from the Air Force at age 55 he was a professional for the Boy Scouts of America, including a 4 year engagement in Japan where he ran the Far East Council for the scouts from the military families assigned in Japan, Korea and the Philippines. He was a 33rd degree Mason and provided many memories for his kids with the scooters of the Shriners at parades as they helped children’s hospitals. He was active in Rotary to the final months of his life. He belonged to, and was an officer in, several aviation and US Air Force related organizations, perhaps most notably “Quiet Birdmen” or QBs.

He remained active in sports, playing in countless softball leagues, helped run a ski club while assigned in Denver, and enjoyed golf and boating. He introduced his son to sailing in “Lightnings” and “Thistles” and bought a 24’ sailboat he dubbed “S’koshi Maru.” He credits that purchase with exciting his son to go to the US Coast Guard Academy; a clever way to cover an impulse purchase. Boating continued as they joined friends in a co-owned 36’ sailboat they kept in Friday Harbor, WA and used during the summers to create lasting fond memories even when living in Arizona.

His love of music did not stop with the Sunday enjoyment of the Choir. He loved jazz, especially Dixieland Jazz, perhaps acquired while awaiting flight school orders and attending Delgado Trade School (aviation maintenance) in New Orleans in 1942.

He loved cars and dreamed and planned for many years to combine that and his love of travel and adventure on a trip along Route 66. Though he never realized that dream, he reveled in the planning and dreaming process. He also enjoyed trains of all varieties and tinkered with small gauge model trains.

His love of animals was consistent with his gentle, compassionate and approachable nature and ultimately led him to not (knowingly) eating chicken because “chickens are my friends.” Apparently he didn’t have any cows or pigs that were friends.

His wife of 70 years passed in 2016. He enjoyed close contact with his family with daughter Debbie nearby. “I don’t know what I’d do without her” was a common refrain in his later years. He looked forward to nightly calls from son Rob as well.

His legacy lives on in his son and daughter, two grandchildren and four great grandchildren. He wanted all to celebrate, not mourn, his life and described his ascension to the afterlife simply by referring to the poem “High Flight” by John Gillespie Magee, Jr.

Oh, I have slipped the surly bonds of earth

And danced the skies on laughter-silvered wings;

Sunward I’ve climbed, and joined the tumbling mirth

Of sun-split clouds—and done a hundred things

You have not dreamed of—wheeled and soared and swung

High in the sunlit silence. Hov’ring there,

I’ve chased the shouting wind along, and flung

My eager craft through the footless halls of air.

Up, up the long delirious, burning blue

I’ve topped the windswept heights with easy grace

Where never lark, or even eagle flew.

And, while with silent, lifting mind I’ve trod

The high untrespassed sanctity of space,

Put out my hand, and touched the face of God.

He will be interred at Eagle Point National Cemetery at 10:00 a.m. on 2 January 2019. A celebration of his life open to all his friends will be held at 3:00 pm on January 1, 2019 at Pioneer Village in Jacksonville, Oregon.

In lieu of flowers, we would like to recommend donations to:

Alzheimer’s Association

National Headquarters

225 Michigan Ave., Fl. 17

Chicago, IL 60601

act.alz.org

Celia’s House in Holmes Park (Hospice)

217 Modoc Ave

Medford, OR 97504

(541)500-8911

sofriendsofhospice.org