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His early education was pursued in the schools of Miss Margaret Cassidy and Messrs. Wrightson, and later at the Albany Academy, and in the fall of 1860 he entered the sophomore class at Union College, graduating in July, 1863. Mr. Parker began the study of the law at the end of his junior year at college and in September, 1863, he entered, as a student, the law oflfice of Cagger, Porter & Hand at Albany, with whom he remained for nearly two years.
Mr. Parker graduated from the Albany Law School in 1864 and in the latter part of the same year was admitted to the bar, and became the law partner of his father on the first day of May, 1865, which continued until the death of Judge Parker on May 13, 1890, in all a period of over twenty-five years. From 1876 until 1888, ex-Judge Edwin Countryman of Cooperstown, N. Y., who had moved to Albany for that purpose, was associated with them under the firm name of Parker & Countryman.
In 1891 Mr. J. Newton Fiero of Kingston, N. Y. , came to Albany and became the partner of Mr. Parker, continuing as such until 1895. Since that time he has had associated with him his two sons, Amasa J. Parker, Jr., and Lewis R. Parker, though no partnership exists between them.
Mr. Parker has been very active in the practice of his profession for over thirty years, practicing in both the State and Federal Courts and taking part in numerous important and well known cases, such as Jackson vs. Lake Shore and Michigan Southern Railroad Company, Hooghkirk vs. the D. & H., Laning vs. the New York Central, Conway vs. Gale, Dunlop vs. Dunlop and McChesney vs. the Panama Railroad Company.
Mr. Parker was one of the organizers of the famous Union College Zouaves, at Schenectady in April, 1861, and served in same. After graduating from college he was enrolled in the National Guard at Albany and in 1866 was commissioned aide-de-camp, with the rank of major on the staff of Gen. John Taylor Cooper, the commandant of the Third Division.
In 1875 he was elected lieutenant-colonel of the Tenth Regiment and two years later was unanimously elected its colonel. He was in command of that regiment during the railroad riots of July, 1877, and the regiment under him reached a strength of eight hundred and fifty men.
Mr. Parker served as president of the National Guard Association of this State, upon its re-organization, from 1878 to 1880 and is the only officer who has filled the position for more than one year. On the re-organization of the National Guard in August, 1886, he was elected brigadier-general of the Third Brigade N. G. S. N. Y., with headquarters at Albany, and served in that capacity until the end of December, 1890, when he resigned. During the period of his command the Third Brigade took part in the Washington Centennial celebration in New York City, April 29, 1889, and in that great parade of nearly fifty thousand troops, the Third Brigade was awarded the highest credit mark for its appearance and discipline by the U. S. Army Board sent to New York by the Federal Government. The brigade on this occasion numbered nearly two thousand eight hundred men.
Mr. Parker was elected to the Assembly in 1882, receiving a majority larger than the number of votes cast for his opponent, and in 1886 and 1887 served in the State Senate, and has since then been twice re-elected to that body, serving in the sessions of that body continuously from 1892 to 1895 inclusive, and siibsequently declined a renomination. When he entered the Senate in January, 1886, he instituted public hearings in the City Hall, Albany, on all local measures in the Legislature before the Senator and four Assemblymen from Albany county. This plan enabled every citizen to attend and learn all about the measures affecting Albany county or any portion of the same and to discuss their merits or demerits.
Naturally, Mr. Parker, during his legislative services of seven years in Assembly and Senate had much to do with military and local matters, as well as with general legislation.
In the Assembly of 1882 he was chairman of the Committee on Military Affairs, and with the aid of the principal National Guard officers of the State revised and greatly simplified and strengthened the Military Code.
The same year he took a prominent part in the obtaining of appropriations, building of State Armories, the adoption of the State service uniform and the establishment of the State Camp at Peekskill. Later on in the Senate, during his six years of service there, he did much for the National Guard in the way of general appropriations, equipment, building and repairing of State Armories, and rifle ranges, improving the Military Code and in strengthening the military force in many ways.
He was, in 1887, the originator and principal projector of the new State Armory, at Albany, obtaining an official condemnation and sale of the old State Arsenal, procuring the first appropriation from the State for the building as well as a most liberal sum from the county of Albany for the site for said Armory, and on his return to the Senate in 1893, during that and the three subsequent years, he obtained further large State appropriations for its extension, completion and equipment.
In regard to local legislation for his district, Mr. Parker was always active, and during his service in the Legislature, never failed to give these matters his best efforts.
In 1883. in the Assembly, he introduced the first bill for the construction of the Hawk street viaduct. He introduced later in the Senate the bill for the construction of the Northern Boulevard and with others succeeded in passing the bill, and later the amended Northern Boulevard law, which obviated the objections of several elements, which had been hostile to this great project.
The Albany Basin bill and many other bills affecting the health and welfare of Albany county and the cities of Albany and Cohoes, received Mr. Parker's close attention and became laws.
Mr. Parker is president of the Board of Trustees of the Albany Law School and as such one of the governors of Union University; a trustee of the Albany Medical College and also of St. Agnes School; a trustee of the Union Trust Company of New York and a director of the Albany City National Bank. He succeeded his father, who had served since 1867 as a manager and was made president of the Board of Managers of the Hudson River State Hospital (for the insane) at Poughkeepsie in
1881, and remained such until January, 1897, when he insisted upon retiring.
Mr. Parker has been prominently connected with the Young Men's Association for many years, and is a member of the Board of Life Trustees and was one of the most active Albanians in projecting the plan and in procuring funds to build Harmanus Bleeker Hall, and is the chairman of the Hall Committee of that Board of Trustees.
Mr. Parker married in 1868, Cornelia Kane Strong, of New Orleans, La., who died December 17, 1883, leaving surviving six children, two sons and four daughters, of whom a son and daughter are married.
Amasa J. Parker, the only surviving son of the late Judge Amasa J. Parker and Harriet Langdon Parker, was born in Delhi, Delaware county, N, Y., on May 6, 1843. In the following year. Judge Parker having been appointed Circuit Judge and Vice Chancellor of the Third Circuit, moved to Albany, where the son has ever since resided.
