Archives West Finding Aid

Dr. Robert Jerome Parsons was a member of the 1955 Eggert-Hatch filming expedition down the Green and Colorado Rivers in 1955.

Robert Jerome Parsons was born in Syracuse, NY, in 1907, and went to medical school at Syracuse University. He interned at Peter Brent Brigham in Boston, Massachusetts, and was a resident fellow at Harvard Medical School. He also interned in Pathology at New York Hospital and Cornell Medical School, where he completed his resident training, and spent three years at Rockefeller University. After teaching Pathology for six years at the University of Michigan, he joined the US Navy, serving as a Lieutenant Commander while conducting research on Malaria and Filariasis. He then moved with his family to the west coast. From 1947 to 1977 he served as Director of Laboratories and Intern and Resident Training in Alameda County, California. for 30 years, retiring in 1977.

In the summer of 1953 Dr. Parsons's brother-in-law, Frederick Hoffman Wood, brought his family out to the west coast for the first time. While on this trip Fred became fascinated by the western part of the United States. A year later when he read an article by Charles Eggert inviting participants to join a group of adventurers to duplicate the adventures of John Wesley Powell, he called Bob and invited him to join in this adventure. Dr. Parsons was quick to sign on. It was an experience of a lifetime for him. Unfortunately because of his responsibilities at the hospital he was unable to take more than two weeks off, and was only able to complete the first segment of the expedition, from Green River, Wyoming, to Jensen, Utah. He followed the rest of the trip through the stories Fred Wood and Charlie Eggert shared and Traveler in the Wilderness, the book about the trip published by the only woman on the trip, 65-year old Cid Ricketts Sumner.

Dr. Parsons died in 1986.