Richard Bordeaux Parker

Parker was the son of Col. Roscoe Parker, a U.S. Army officer (Cavalry), and grew up in U.S. Army posts across the southwest with a stint in Vermont and another in Kansas. He attended Kansas State University, but left in 1943 to join the U.S. Army during World War II. Parker served as an infantry officer with the 106th Infantry Division (first platoon of the Anti-Tank Company of the 422nd Infantry Regiment), where he was captured by the Germans at the Battle of the Bulge and briefly imprisoned.[1][2] Captured at the same time as Parker, was Donald Prell, who commanded the second platoon of the Anti-Tank Company.[3] After the war, Parker returned to Kansas State, where he completed his B.S. degree in 1947 and then earned an M.S. degree in 1948, before joining the U.S. Foreign Service in 1949.[1][2]

Parker served as deputy chief of mission in Rabat, Morocco from 1970 to 1974. He was ambassador to Algeria from 1975 to 1977, to Lebanon in 1977, and finally to Morocco from 1978 to 1979. He retired from the U.S. Foreign Service in 1981 and became the editor of The Middle East Journal. In addition to his diplomatic career, Parker taught at the University of Virginia, Johns Hopkins University, and Lawrence University. He also served as the first president of the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training from 1986 to 1989.

In 1982, Parker participated in a study group held at the Council on Foreign Relations where he discussed current problems in North Africa. After these meetings Parker spent two years compiling and writing North Africa: Regional Tensions and Strategic Concerns. His book was published in relation with and through the Council on Foreign Relations.

In June 2004, Parker received the American Foreign Service Association's lifetime Contributions to American Diplomacy award. He died at a nursing home in Washington, D.C. in January 2011.[1] The ashes of Parker and his wife Jeanne were interred at Arlington National Cemetery in February 2011.[4][5]

Ambassador Parker's papers are held at Georgetown University, in Washington, D.C.

Some of Richard Bordeaux Parker's photographs [6] are held at the Freer Gallery and Arthur M. Sackler Gallery Archives in Washington, D.C. The collection includes black and white negatives of Islamic architecture throughout Algeria, Cairo, Lebanon, Syria, Jordan, Morocco, and Spain.[7]

• A Practical Guide to Islamic Monuments in Cairo, 1974
• A Practical Guide to Islamic Monuments in Morocco, 1981
• North Africa: Regional Tensions and Strategic Concerns, (ISBN 0-275-92773-3, 1987) (revised and updated version)
• The Politics of Miscalculation in the Middle East, (ISBN 0-2532-0781-9, 1993)
• The Six-Day War: A Retrospective, (ISBN 0-8130-1383-6, 1996)
• The October War, (ISBN 0-8130-1853-6, 2001)
• Uncle Sam in Barbary: A Diplomatic History, (ISBN 0-8130-2696-2, 2004)
• Memoirs of a Foreign Service Arabist, (ISBN 978-0-9886376-6-5, 2013)

Renaissance Man

Washington Post

Middle East Institute

• Foreign Service Journal article on his Lifetime Contributions to American Diplomacy Award.
• Appearances on C-SPAN