A Good Age: At 96, Quincy native receives Navy's Combat Action Ribbon for WWII service

QUINCY − At age 96, more than 77 years after he completed his military service during World War II, Howard Jefferson Parker Jr. has received the Navy's Combat Action Ribbon for bravery and persistence he showed under hostile enemy action in the Pacific theater.

Parker, who lives now in Mississippi, was born on Jan. 22, 1926, in Quincy. He grew up in Wollaston, in a duplex at 137 Clay St., where he also lived with his wife, Joyce, for a few years after they were married in 1953. He still talks about his memories of swimming in the Quincy quarries and getting hot fudge sundaes at the first Howard Johnson's restaurant in the country, using tips from delivering The Patriot Ledger.

After spending two years at Quincy High School, in January 1944 Parker was a senior at Mount Hermon School in Gill. He and his classmates had taken accelerated courses in summer school so they could graduate six months early and answer the nation's call for military service. He joined the U.S. Navy the day before his 18th birthday, managing to conceal the fact he was color blind.

After completing gunnery school, he was assigned to the Navy Armed Guard on the SS South Africa Victory, a merchant ship transporting ammunition and supplies.

Parker said the ship was sent to the South Pacific "to prepare to take over the islands that the Japanese had taken earlier. We dodged U-boats and kamikaze submarines, but we did not fire back." Their mission was to deliver the supplies.

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He served on and protected merchant marine ships, which transported supplies, food, lumber and ammunition. Parker's ship was at the invasion of Guam and at Ulithi, an atoll in the Pacific where a Japanese manned suicide torpedo sank a U.S. tanker.

At the end of the war, he served on another ship, which carried former Japanese POWs from China back to Japan. Discharged in June 1946, he said, "We came home to unbelievable benefits because of the GI Bill."

The criteria for the Navy's Combat Action Ribbon requires "bona fide evidence" that the service member was engaged in direct combat with an enemy.

On Oct. 28, U.S. Sen. Roger Wicker, R-Mississippi, presented Parker with the Navy's Combat Action Ribbon in a ceremony in Ridgeland, Mississippi, where Parker lives in an assisted living community, near his oldest son, Jefferson Parker.

Honoring World War II service members years later

Local veterans agents received the news about Parker's award at age 96 with enthusiasm.

"It is vitally important that we recognize the bravery and valor of all those who served in combat," Kevin Cook, Milton's veterans agent, said. "Doing so 77 years afterward does not diminish the importance of awarding it with his family present. We owe these men and women of the Greatest Generation everything."

Christine Cugini, Quincy's director of veterans services, said, "Wow!" The different service medals are important to veterans and their families, even after the veteran has passed, "because our medals tell the story of our military service and where we were and what we did."

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Honoring Parker and others years after their service is another way of thanking the group they represent, she said, noting very few veterans of World War II are left.

About 70 million people fought in World War II, and about 167,000 survive in the United States.

City and town veteran agents stressed that they will help families determine if someone is eligible for a military award and guide them in the research and paperwork.

Parker's son Karl, who lives near Albany, New York, first heard of the award several years ago and, in April 2021, he visited his father, contacted his senator’s office and spoke with the veterans liaison.

"I helped my father fill out the necessary paperwork to apply for the Combat Action Ribbon and submitted that to the senator’s office," Karl Parker said. "They forwarded the request to the Department of Defense for their research and review."

The citation with his award describes his "exemplary performance while engaged with the enemy under hostile fire. Mr. Parker met the enemy and fulfilled his duty with honor and esteem ... in keeping with the highest traditions of the U.S. naval service."

“Mr. Parker served admirably under very trying conditions in the Pacific, under active fire," Wicker was reported as saying. "Only about 15% of servicemen actually see combat as he did. He is very deserving of the Combat Action Ribbon.”

The award was established by the Department of the Navy in 1969. Created at the height of the Vietnam War, the ribbon is described as both the most highly regulated and the most retroactively applied award in both the Navy and the Marine Corps.

In order to be eligible, veterans must have participated in ground or surface combat after Dec. 6, 1941, but before March 1, 1961. They cannot already have been recognized for the same participation. Records technicians and the service branch must complete intensive investigative research to ensure that the recipient qualifies.

Living a full life

Parker said that "of course" he is very thankful for the award, but that he also "thinks of the others who served and those who died in combat in the Atlantic and Pacific theaters."

After the war, Parker attended Boston University on the GI Bill, graduated and then received his master's in education from Boston University. In the early 1950s, he taught school in Braintree for three years and also in Northbridge before moving to Pine Bush, New York, where he worked as an elementary school principal for almost 30 years. He retired in 1982.

He and his late wife, Joyce, who died this year at age 97, had three sons: Jefferson, Karl and Dean. He has 12 grandchildren and 10 great-grandchildren. A Maine native, Joyce met Parker when they both were teachers in Northbridge; they were married for 68 years.

In a telephone interview with his son Jeff, Parker recalled a few of his fondest memories of Quincy in a robust voice.

"During the late 1930s and 1940s, I was a news carrier for The Patriot Ledger," he said. "I would pick up my papers at the corner of Fenno and Hancock streets and deliver them on my bike. And Howard Johnson had his first restaurant right there in Quincy and, with my newspaper tips, I loved to go there and get a hot fudge sundae."

On Saturdays, he loved to go to the Quincy football stadium for the games.

His parents, Louise and Howard Parker, were members of the Wollaston Congregational Church and he called that "one of the greatest experiences of my life."

When Parker enlisted in 1944, I was 2 months old and like so many others, I grew up in a postwar world that felt mostly safe and filled with opportunity. It is very meaningful to still be able to personally thank a veteran of World War II for his courage and willingness to step forward and serve. My life has been what it is in part because of the sacrifices of so many brave men and women.

Thank you, Seaman 1st Class Parker.

Reach Sue Scheible at sscheible@patriotledger.com.

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This article originally appeared on The Patriot Ledger: Quincy native receives Navy's Combat Action Ribbon for WWII service