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Charles Thomas Parsons, Jr. (also known as Chick Parsons) was a businessman, diplomat, and decorated World War II veteran. He was born April 22, 1902, in Shelbyville, Tennessee. Parsons died in May 1988, survived by his four sons, Michael, Peter, Patrick and Jose. ==Pre-war years== Charles Parsons' interest in the Philippines occurred because two of his uncles had gone there to seek their fortune. Their letters home ignited Charles' imagination and sense of adventure. As a result, he took courses in shorthand and Spanish while in school at Chattanooga. After graduating from school, he held a job as a court reporter for a year or two. Then in 1921, at the age of 19, he arrived at Manila after working across the Pacific as a crewman on a freighter. His knowledge of shorthand and Spanish allowed him to qualify as secretary to U.S. Governor-General Leonard Wood. For three years, Parsons traveled throughout the Philippines with Wood and got to know the Filipino people, learning their language and customs, as well as picking up knowledge of Philippine geography. All this would serve him well when he later went into business for himself and served as a U.S. naval officer during the war years.〔Ingham, T. ''Rendezvous by Submarine''. 1945.〕 A postgraduate course in commerce and his increased fluency in the local dialects allowed Parsons to find work with the Philippine Telephone and Telegraph Company. Then in 1927, he went to Zamboanga in Mindanao as a buyer of logs and lumber for the Meyer Muzzell Company. This company, financed by Mayor James Rolph of San Francisco, exported timber to the United States. This job required Parsons to travel extensively throughout Mindanao, learning details about the island and its inhabitants that would save his life many times during World War II.〔 The Philippines had become like home to Parsons. While at Zamboanga, he met and married Katrushka (Katsy) Jurika, daughter of Stephen Jurika, a naturalized Czechoslovakian, and Blanche Walker, of Oxnard, California. At that time, Parsons was 30 years old and Katrushka was only 15, but their marriage was solid and quickly produced three sons — Michael, Peter and Patrick. The Parsons family moved to Manila in 1929, where Charles took a job managing the Luzon Stevedoring Company as "boss stevedore," which operated a fleet of tugboats, chrome and manganese mines, and other activities. Other business interests included managing the North American Trading and Importing Company, which produced alcohol from molasses discarded from sugar refining, and the La Insula Cigar and Cigarette Factory, one of the largest tobacco interests in the Philippines and owed by Spanish royalty. Ironically, due to a Filipino law requiring a 60% American or Filipino interest in a foreign company operating in the Philippines, Parsons also became president of Nihon Kogyo Kabushiki Kaisha, a Japanese mining company.〔Parsons, P. ''Commander Chick Parsons and the Japanese''.〕 In 1929, according to Ingham (1945), he also made another important career decision. He joined the U.S. Naval Reserve as a Lieutenant (jg), and took active duty with the Pacific fleet whenever possible.〔 However, Peter Parsons, his son, states that his father joined the U.S. Naval Reserve in 1932, and was assigned to submarines.〔 By the fall of 1941, Charles Parsons was thirty-nine years old and anticipating an early retirement, as well as spending more time enjoying his hobby of polo. He had previously help organize the Los Tamaros Club in Manila to insure high-quality polo games in Manila. Parsons was proud to be the "only polo-playing stevedore in the world." Then, on the night of December 8, 1941, a fellow reserve officer woke Parsons up and informed him that the entire personnel and equipment of the Luzon Stevedoring Company had been taken into the U.S. Navy. Parsons was immediately sworn into active duty as a full Lieutenant.〔 The Japanese had bombed the Philippines. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Chick Parsons」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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