 Born in Baltimore, Maryland, on April 8, 1929, Parker graduated from Baltimore City College in 1946.He began his broadcasting career in the late 1940s on WASA (now WHGM), an AM radio station in Havre de Grace, Maryland, hosting a music program called the "Royal Record Review".He moved to television when the medium was in its infancy, joining WAAM-TV (now WJZ-TV) in Baltimore in 1951.