Talbot Fort Parker Jr.

Talbot Fort Parker, Jr., M.D. July 31, 1927 -- December 30, 2017 Longtime Goldsboro physician Talbot Fort Parker, Jr., M.D. [“Tod”] died Saturday, December 30, 2017, at Homestead Hospice, in Waynesville NC, from complications of prostate cancer. Born on July 31, 1927, in Goldsboro, Tod was the son of Talbot Fort Parker, Sr. and Jane Agnes McAdams Parker. He attended Goldsboro City Schools, and entered the University of North Carolina in 1944. His college studies were put on hold when he enlisted in the Navy, and served as a Hospital Apprentice 2nd Class during the tail end of WWII. Tod returned to UNC in 1946, where he was a member of Alpha Tau Omega Fraternity. In 1947, 20-year-old Tod entered Thomas Jefferson Medical College in Philadelphia, a short ten minute walk from the Academy of Music, where the renowned Philadelphia Orchestra rehearsed and performed, led by legendary conductor Eugene Ormandy. For the next four years, Tod frequently attended rehearsals, at no charge, sharpening his already keen love of classical music. Following his graduation from medical school in 1951, Tod held a rotating internship at Jefferson-Hillman Hospital with the University of Alabama in Birmingham. A residency in the field of OBGYN followed in 1952 at Watts Hospital in Durham, where Miss Willie Elizabeth Drummond was working as a nurse. They were married in November of 1953 in Amherst, Virginia. Earlier in 1953, Tod rejoined the Navy, this time as a Lieutenant assigned to the Admiral’s medical staff at Portsmouth Naval Hospital in Norfolk, where the Admiral had assured him he would remain for an uneventful two years. However, transfer orders arrived sending Tod to a place no one had ever hear of – Olongopo in the Philippines. Once Tod could find proper housing for his young bride, the Navy flew Betty out, and also paid to ship their automobile from California. While stationed at Subic Bay Naval Base, 27 year old Lt. Parker was the only American doctor in all of the Philippines with any obstetrical training, and so he held the position of Chief of Obstetrics during this tour of duty. After leaving the Navy in 1955, Tod continued his obstetrics training at NC Memorial Hospital in Chapel Hill, under Robert A. Ross, M.D. who headed the Department of Obstetrics. He returned to Goldsboro in 1957, to open his private practice at the corner of N. Herman Street & Simmons Street, directly across from the old hospital. For his first months in practice, he had almost no patients and little income, so to pay his office utility bills, he would hand-deliver checks to save the cost of a stamp. Two long time staff members were instrumental in Tod’s success: Vicky Mercer started as Tod’s receptionist while still a teenager, and worked for him for her entire professional career, rising to be office manager. And Ann Baker worked for decades with Tod as his office nurse. For many, many years, Tod and Kenneth Wilkins, M.D. were the only obstetricians for Wayne and some surrounding counties, and while each was in solo practice, they covered for each other, every other night during the week, and every other weekend. When Wayne County built a new hospital, Tod built spacious new offices nearby, re-named his practice Wayne Women’s Clinic, and recruited other OBGYN’s to Goldsboro to join his practice. Wayne Women’s Clinic continues today to meet the health care needs of Wayne County women. Tod retired from private practice at age 65, but continued to work part-time for another sixteen years with the Family Planning Clinic of the Wayne County Health Department, where his boss was his good friend and colleague Kenneth Wilkins. After 58 years of practicing medicine, Tod fully retired on his 82nd birthday in 2009. Tod delivered several sets of twins, but attended only one triplet birth, and that was in Birmingham as a first year resident. Tod had developed an early interest in medicine during his many summer weeks at Boy Scout Camp Tuscarora, where he was often in the infirmary with stumped toes, insect bites, and swimmer’s ear. He had great memories of his scoutmaster C. H. Weston. Some of his fellow scouts and lifelong friends from boyhood, were Louis Maxwell, Bob Powell, and Dick Borden. Tod had an ocean front beach cottage called Fort Parker at Atlantic Beach, which his father had bought in the late 1930s, and he spent a large part of his summers there annually. Later he owned a sound front cottage at Morehead, and he always called Carteret County his summer home, until just a few years ago, when he retired to the mountains. Sailing was a life-long passion for Tod, having learned those skills at a teenager at the side of old salt Josiah Bailey of Morehead. Tod taught his sister Jane to sail, and in their youth the two often raced together against the locals in the sound at Morehead, in a wooden Spritsail named the Bucket. When Tod had children of his own, he passed along his love of the sport, teaching them in his 19-foot Flying Scot 440, named Ma-Be. Originally co-owned by Bob Powell and Tod, Ma-Be got her name from the first syllables of their non-sailing wives. In the 1960s, Tod combined skills he learned in scouting with his love of sailing, and started taking his young family on camping trips to Kerr Lake, where Betty would keep two children in line on the shore, while Tod pressed two others to crew for him in regattas. Morehead had the best wind for sailing, but Kerr Lake had the Carolina Sailing Club and organized racing. In the early 1970s, Tod and two of his teenage children raced Ma-Be to win the Governor’s Cup Regatta at Kerr Lake. This was just one of the many regattas that Tod won over the years. For many years, Tod had a standing reservation for the “corner room” at the River Neuse Motel in Oriental for the July weekend of the annual Oriental Sailing Social. Boating, and messing around in boats, was second nature for Tod. In addition to scouting, sailing, and classical music, Tod was an avid snow skier, jumping at every opportunity to attend a medical conference at Aspen or Snowmass. In October of 1989, Tod met Elizabeth May Shannon, and they married February 3, 1990, in Goldsboro where they lived, until retiring to Waynesville. Anyone and everyone who met them remarked on the love they demonstrated towards one another, and Elizabeth was at Tod's side when he died. Tod was active in many medical associations and served in leadership positions in most of them. He was President of the Medical Staff of the Wayne County Hospital, and Chairman of its OBGYN department. He was President of the Wayne County Medical Society, and held membership in the North Carolina Medical Society, the American Congress of Obstetricians & Gynecology, and the North Carolina Section of ACOG. He served several terms as “arrangements chair” for the North Carolina OBGYN Society, where he kept getting re-elected after adding a welcome cocktail party to the annual meeting agenda, and later served as Society President. Of special importance was his membership in the Robert A. Ross Society, and he continued to attend the annual “Daddy Ross” meetings until his death. He was an Eagle Scout and a cradle to grave Presbyterian. Tod is survived by his second wife Elizabeth May Shannon Parker of Waynesville; children Robert Fort Parker [Bobby] & wife Donna of LaGrange, Nancy Starr Parker Parson & husband George of Atlanta GA, Richard Todd Parker & wife Felisa of Wendell, and Charles Drummond Parker of Greenville; step-children Richard Sterling Ingram Jr. [Rick] and wife Susan of Ponte Vedra Beach FL and Sunny Shannon Ingram of Waynesville; grandchildren Harrison Todd Parker & wife Kristin, Jordan Talbot Parker, Molly Elizabeth Parker, Amy Lynn Parker, Thomas Wesley Parson V, Virginia Drummond Parson; and step-grandchildren Lindsay Ingram Judy, Richard Tyler Ingram, Morgan Ashley Ingram, and Timothy Gray Ingram. Tod was preceded in death by his first wife Willie Elizabeth Drummond Parker [Betty], who died in 1988 from cancer; his sisters Jane Agnes Parker Smith and Matilda Eunice Parker Thrasher, and his daughter-in-law Tina Holland Parker. A memorial service is planned for Saturday, January 6, 2018, at 2:00 p.m. at First Presbyterian Church in Goldsboro, with the Rev. Dr. Robert F. Bardin officiating. Memorial gifts may be made to Homestead Hospice in Waynesville, First Presbyterian Church in Waynesville, or First Presbyterian Church in Goldsboro. Arrangements by Seymour Funeral Home in Goldsboro and Garrett Funeral Home in Waynesville.