February 16, 2023 – Parsons Elementary School celebrated 56 years of education with a Founders Day celebration.
Parsons Elementary School opened in February 1967, named for Decatur native Judge James B. Parsons. Students, family and staff celebrated the event with food, art, and entertainment by the students.
In its first year, 582 students attended Parsons. It was quickly determined that the building could not house all the students. In the spring of 1967 a new, 6-room addition was built. During the 1966-1967 school year three new elementaries opened in Decatur. They included Parsons, Stevenson, and Adams.
The school’s namesake was the first African American to serve as a judge in a U.S. district court, appointed to the U.S. District Court for Northern Illinois in 1961 by President John F. Kennedy. On April 17, 1975, he became the first Black Chief Judge of a District Court; one month later, he was elected the first Black representative to the United States Judicial Conference.
Judge Parsons came to Decatur at the age of six, and attended Oakland School, Roosevelt Junior High School, and graduated third in his class from Decatur High School. In 1934 he graduated from James Millikin University, became a teacher, and then served in the U.S. Navy in World War II.
He attended the University of Chicago Law School and in 1961 was named to the U.S. District Court for Northern Illinois.
” The new elementary school,” said Judge Parsons during it’s opening, “will provide an opportunity for children to learn about America’s greatness and what must be done to keep it great. It will develop the capacity to live in tomorrow’s world of science and technology, and promote a new type of society respecting human dignity without regard to ethnic differences.”
Judge Parsons commented at the dedication ceremony that he was humbled by the situation and deeply honored. He said he viewed the naming of the school in his honor as a continuation of “an affection, which I experienced here during my childhood.”
In 1992, after 30 years of service, Judge Parsons retired from active trial duty. He died in Chicago, in 1993 at 81 years old. He is buried at Greenwood Cemetery in Decatur, Illinois.
