James L. and Ella Parker: landowning farmers south of Parkers Creek
Table of Contents
Introduction: James L. and Ella Parker
James L. “Jimmy” Parker (b 1874-1877, d 1944) was the son of David Parker (b. ca. 1830, d. ca. 1895), an African American farmer and Civil War veteran, and his wife Susan J. Parker (b. ca. 1840-1845, d. 1927), featured on the webpage David and Susan J. Parker: Civil War veteran and farm family south of Parkers Creek. Jimmy Parker was married to Ella Parker (b 1882 or 1883, née Simms, d after 1950) and the couple had eight children. Several of their descendants lived (and some still live) in the vicinity of Parkers Creek. (Source information for this paragraph: endnote 1)
The ACLT North-South hiking trail (green dashed line on the map below) crosses the properties formerly owned by Jimmy Parker and by his father David Parker. A trail sign is planned for late 2025 to mark the site of Jimmy and Ella Parker’s house.
Parker properties south of Parkers Creek. Top: David Parker’s 1871 acquisition. Bottom: James L. “Jimmy” Parker’s two-part acquisition of 40 acres, 1919 and 1926. Property research by Art Cochran, map by Exa Marmee Grubb.
1919 and 1926: James L. Parker acquires land
Jimmy Parker acquired two adjacent tracts of land south of Parkers Creek. The first was a 10-acre plot purchased from George T. and Ethel Weems in 1919 (AAH 04/071). The second was a 30-acre parcel purchased from Thomas Parran. This sale, however, was not memorialized in formal deed. Instead, Parker’s ownership is referenced as an exception in a 1926 deed that transferred 81 acres from Parran to John Cephas Wallace (AAH-17-22). The wording is as follows (emphasis by editor): “being the same land conveyed to Thomas Parran by deed dated May 6, 1924, excepting thirty acres sold to James Parker, adjoining the land formerly owned by James Parker.” (Endnote 2)
Tom Parran was an active political figure in Calvert County. Among other offices, he was a Republican member of the U.S. House of Representatives from 1911 to 1913. Parran made many loans to Black and White land buyers, and his name turns up frequently in property transactions and mortgages in the first third of the 20th century. In this case, Parran may have arranged for Jimmy Parker’s acquisition, which probably included a mortgage, but neglected to ensure that the deed or loan documents were registered with the county clerk.
Jimmy and Ella Parker’s property is included in a 1938 aerial photograph made by the U.S. Soil Conservation Service. It shows the location of the Parker’s dwelling at the western end of the property, and the farm lane that provided access from the east.
Jimmy and Ella Parker’s property in a 1938 aerial photograph made by the U.S. Soil Conservation Service. The colored overlays and textual labels were added by the PCHT project in 2025. The farm fields to the east, flanking what is now called Scientists Cliffs Road, were then owned and farmed by John Cephas Wallace, described on the webpage Delois Harrod Johnson and Phyllis Harrod Dawkins recall grandparents’ farm.
1944: Foreclosure and sale of James L. Parker's land
The preceding section describes Jimmy Parker’s two-part purchase of land. As noted, the 1919 deed for 10 acres was registered with the county clerk but no similar deed (or mortgage document) for the 1926 purchase of 30 acres was registered.
State and county taxes on Parker’s land went unpaid from 1937 to 1941. In 1943, Samuel C. Cox, the Calvert County Treasurer, submitted petition 966 to the Circuit Court. The petition reports overdue state taxes of $4.78 and unpaid county taxes of $32.07. The petition states that 40 acres are assessed in the names of both James Parker and Thomas Parran, probably reflecting the absence of a deed that assigned ownership to Parker.
Calvert Journal, June 19, 1943.
The petition includes the Calvert Journal announcement of a public auction of the property (illustrated above). A later section of the petition reports on the sale “at the Court House door in Prince Frederick on the 27th day of October 1942 at Eleven o’clock A.M.” to the Prince Frederick attorney J. Wilmer Johnson and his wife Dorothy Johnson for $300. In 1947, the Johnsons sold the land to Shelton Bowen; in 1957, Bowen sold the land to Joe Showalter; in 2006, Showalter donated the land to the ACLT.
1950s and 1960s: Remembering past activities, family and community
None of the owners that followed Jimmy Parker–the Johnsons, Shelton Bowen, and Joe Showalter–farmed the land or built structures there. In this context, especially during the 1950s and 1960s, members of the Parker family who lived nearby were able to continue accessing the property. Jimmy Parker was by then deceased but one of his brothers–David Parker, called “Cook”–and two of Jimmy’s sons–Jimmy (junior) and Oliver–lived nearby.
Oliver’s daughter Cleo Parker, born in 1955, explained, “When I was a young child, we went back, i- it was still considered Uncle Jimmy’s place back then, or my grandfather’s place. And that’s what we were told. The majority of the frame of the house . . . and the chimney was also still there. And in later years it collapsed, and the bricks came down.” (Endnote 3)
Cleo Parker lives on Scientists Cliff Road in Port Republic, about one-quarter mile south of her granduncle Cook Parker’s former residence near the point of entry to Jimmy Parker’s former land. Cleo recalled repurposing things that had been left behind. “On the left,” Cleo Parker said, “there used to be a barn set there and you’d turn and go back in there and that was Cook’s place. And all my growing up younger days, we could go back, and we would get the bricks from the houses that was back there. [In the cold of winter] we would bring them to put on the stove and put them in our bed for feet warming.” In addition to the bricks, other building materials could be recycled. “And see,” Cleo Parker said, “most of those houses, wind and storm took them down. Some of the wood, they would go get it, I guess use it for kindling wood, firewood because it was seasoned real . . . And so that’s how a lot of that got away.”
Photo: Cleo Parker in 2018.
Cleo Parker: community connections through the woods, and the importance of history
The old road through Jimmy Parker’s former land was one of several east-west routes through the woods and wetlands that connected the families on Scientists Cliff Road to relatives on Parkers Creek Road and, in earlier days, to institutions like Brown’s United Methodist Church and the Parkers Creek one room school. Granddaughter Cleo Parker remembers the hike: “Especially when it was damp in the fall, when the leaves [had fallen] . . . be careful of snakes and stuff, they always tell us, because the copperheads in the fall would have buried themselves and be the same color as the leaves. But we would struggle and would go on out to my uncle Big Boy [Cephas Wallace Jr., on Parkers Creek Road].”
Although the main paths were well known, groups of children sometimes needed tricks to keep from getting lost. “We stuck together,” Cleo Parker said, “like a thick and thin family. We wouldn’t go nowhere without, uh, a– all of us that was in the age, and the little ones that was under us. And they always had to be the chief. And they taught us how to find our way back ’cause everywhere we went, we snapped a limb branch on a tree to make sure we got back. And that’s how we traveled through the woods.”
Sometimes Cleo Parker’s maternal grandfather John Cephas Wallace took the family to Brown’s Church on foot, a one mile trek through the woods, crossing a deep ravine called the Big Swamp. “Because my grandmother and grandfather went to Brown’s,” Cleo Parker said, “they walked to church and had a- all of us behind them. My grandmother would be in the front, the children would be in the–my grandfather called them children–would be in the middle, and then my grandfather, Cephas, he would be behind. He brought up the end.”
Cleo cherishes those memories as well as the teachings of an older generation. She refers to her recall of family history, “all the history I can remember,” explaining that her elders “enlightened us, so we would know history. And they said, ‘Well, you learn about George Washington, George Washington wasn’t related to you.’ But then my mother said that it was time to learn about my family, ‘so you can hand it down to your kids and all, grandkids.’ And so my mother would take us sometime and sit in a high chair, and we’d sit down on [the] floor and she would tell us who was related [in the family].”
Endnotes
Endnote 1. James L. Parker’s death certificate dated 23 May 1944 provides a birth date of 15 June 1877. Meanwhile, Parker’s 1918 draft registration has 1876. The 1870, 1880, 1910, and 1930 census indicate 1874 (depending upon month of enumeration). Margie Alverta [Parker] Young’s Social Security application identifies James Parker as her father and Ella V. Simms (maiden name) as her mother. At this writing (May 2025), we identify the following as the children of James L. and Ella Parker, including married names for women and birthdate(s), which vary according to source: William Parker, 1902; Mary Ida Parker, 1903; Virginia Lulu (or Lulu Virginia), 1906; James E. “Jimmy” Parker [often referred to as Junior], 1908 or 1909; (Bernis or Bernice) Oliver Parker, 1911 or 1913; Walter Parker, 1912; Archie Parker, 1915; and Margie Alverta Parker, 1917.
Endnote 02. Our analysis indicates that James Parker continued to own the 10-acre plot at the time he acquired the adjacent 30 acres, and we interpret the reference “formerly owned” to mean “already owned” or “previously owned.”
Endnote 3. Cleo Parker’s statements are from interviews recorded by Carl Fleischhauer on 27 October 2018 and 16 May 2025.
