Truckin' on the Western Branch

Ace Parker, Bill Dudley, and Bruce Smith. Image by Sheally

Clarence “Ace” Parker—Football and baseball pro Parker attended Churchland High before Woodrow Wilson High lured him away to become a five-sports star there in the early 1930s. Parker was an All American in football and also played baseball and basketball at Duke University. The Brooklyn Dodgers of the National Football League drafted him in 1937, but he opted to sign with Connie Mack to play shortstop for the Philadelphia Athletics. At the end of his first season, he agreed to join the Dodgers and in 1939 played quarterback in the first pro football game to be televised (Dodgers 23–Philadelphia Eagles 14). In 1940 Parker was the NFL’s MVP.

After serving in the Navy during World War II, Parker returned to the Dodgers and then played baseball with the Durham Bulls and the Portsmouth Cubs. He coached baseball and football at Duke and was inducted into the NFL Hall of Fame in 1972.

Parker and Chandler Harper were teammates on Wilson High’s golf and baseball teams (Parker, the shortstop, and Harper, a pitcher). They continued to play golf together and Bill Leffler remembered, “One time Ace, 67, and Chandler Harper, 66, were playing at Bide-a-Wee on Chandler’s birthday—and both shot their ages.” Frank D. Lawrence—Baseball Frank D. Lawrence, a banker, was honored for being a guiding force in professional baseball for half a century. He launched his first minor league team, The Truckers, in 1913, as part of the Virginia League for 15 years. His Trucker teams won pennants in 1920, 1921, and 1927. He owned the Portsmouth Cubs for 20 years until 1955 when the Piedmont League folded. Both Ace Parker and Eddie Stanky played for him.

Lawrence, who lived in Churchland, brought night and Sunday baseball to the area and promoted the construction of Portsmouth Stadium, later named Frank D. Lawrence Stadium, in 1941.

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