Helen Parker was born in Okolona, on March 18, 1929, the daughter of Tom and Belle Park and sister to Tom Jr. and Reida. Helen’s father Tom was a teacher and coach so she arrived at her “calling” naturally. She loved sports, all sports, playing basketball and cheerleading first at Okolona, then at White Hall her 10th and 11thgrade years and finally at Glendale her senior year. After graduation from Glendale High she attended Henderson State College for two summers and a fall session. Henderson did not have women’s athletics at that time, but Helen participated in their intramural program to feed her competitive spirit. It was there that she met and married Buddy Parker or as she tells it, just added “er” to her last name. Buddy had just accepted a coaching position at Ashdown, so in August of 1947 Helen and Buddy boarded a bus with their two suitcases and headed to their first and last stop on the coaching trail. At Ashdown she worked as a substitute teacher and then a health and PE teacher for 4th, 5th and 6th grades while she completed her BSE degree at Texarkana College and the University of Arkansas during the summers. During those years she would walk over to the high
3 school and help Buddy with the high school girl’s basketball team. Their house was a home away from home for the girl basketball players and their newly purchased car was the team vehicle for rides home from practices and games. It took Helen just two years to land the state basketball runner-up trophy and in another 8 seasons she won the first of her 5 state basketball championships. She would later add volleyball to that list of state titles. By measure of just her coaching successes, Helen Parker was a Hall of Famer, but she had bigger fish to fry. Many small schools such as Ashdown didn’t have athletic directors, but Helen learned to perform the duties of that role from her husband and mentor Buddy Parker. She worked with Buddy carrying out those tasks for six years and then “just continued” doing it all for the rest of her career – and what a career it was. By the late 60’s Helen was discussing with her fellow girl’s basketball coaches the need for girls to have more athletic opportunities. They wanted an All-Star game for girls like the boys were playing in Little Rock each summer and for the Activities Association to sanction more sports for girls. On April 4, 1970, an investigative committee of seven coaches appointed by J.M. “Johnie” Burnett Executive Director of the AAA, met for the first time in the Ashdown High School library with Helen Parker as chair. Two months later this same group became the Arkansas High School Girls Athletic Committee and would present a proposal to the AAA Board to institute a Girl’s All-Star basketball game and to add both girl’s tennis and golf as AAA sanctioned sports. The passing of that proposal by the AAA in November of that year became the watershed event that would usher in a new era of opportunities for the girls of Arkansas that flourishes still today. Helen has been honored as the state’s Outstanding Volleyball Coach and the Outstanding Coach in Arkansas High School Girls Athletics. She has received the National Federation’s Distinguished Service Award and the coveted Curtis King Award from the Arkansas High School Coaches Association. She has been named to the Arkansas High School Coaches Hall of Fame and the Arkansas Sports Hall of Fame and has been honored by her adopted home town with the renaming of the Ashdown High School Gym to “Parker Gym”. And the list goes on. Today Helen still resides in Ashdown and continues her active involvement in church and community activities. The profound effects of her lifetime of giving to her kids, her town and her state cannot be overstated, and her contributions to our profession will echo far into the future