Parker, Gordon

Gordon Langley Parker was born on 15 September 1916, the fifth son and sixth child of Clarence Parker (1871-1959) and Mary Graham Parker (nee Smeaton) (1878-1968).

Gordon was a keen athlete and cyclist, taking part in various road races and cycling carnivals in the 1930s. He won the North Island professional cycling championship title in October 1936 for riding from Hamilton to Auckland in a time of three hours, 25 minutes and 25 seconds. He even climbed Paritūtū with his bicycle, being spotted at the top in what the Taranaki Daily News described as an “unusual and unprecedented” act.

Gordon also loved to fly. He was a member of the New Plymouth Aero Club, having won an aviation scholarship in 1932, so when the Second World War broke out he tried to enlist in the Royal New Zealand Air Force. Initially rejected in July 1940, he was subsequently accepted and, according to his father, “keenly desired to go to the war”. But Clarence needed him on the family farm and appeared before the No.3 Armed Forces Appeal Board on 26 November 1941 to plead for Gordon to be allowed to stay home for another six months. The appeal was granted and Gordon was not called for service until July 1942. He then became a Flying Officer in the RNZAF along with his older brother Clarence Robert Parker (1906-1970) who was already an instructor and later served in the Pacific as an Acting Squadron Leader.

Gordon married Bessie Dora Cole (1924-2009) at St Mary’s Church in New Plymouth in September 1944. They had four children – Robert, Carol, Dianne and Janette – and farmed on Kent Road, just a few kilometres from the Mangorei Memorial Hall which was constructed in 1952 to honour men from the area who died in WWII.

Gordon Parker died on Anzac Day in 1987 aged 70 and his ashes are buried at Awanui Cemetery.