Mary Evelyn Parker - Helping To Elect McKeithen

Helping To Elect McKeithen

In the 1963-1964 gubernatorial race, Mrs. Parker was a key operative in the campaign to elect John McKeithen, then one of the state's three public service commissioners, as governor. McKeithen's campaign was managed by Blanche Long, and Mrs. Parker delivered speeches on the candidate's behalf. One of her high-powered speeches—and Dodd had taught her speech at Oakdale High School—televised across the state was called "All that Glitters Is Not Gold." The title referred to a line from Shakespeare, but it was really an effective attack on the "reform" record of McKeithen's intraparty opponent, former New Orleans Mayor deLesseps Story Morrison, Sr. In her stern, tough, no-nonsense demeanor, Mrs. Parker was in fact playing the role as "hatchet woman" for the McKeithen forces.

In the first McKeithen term, she was rewarded with a position in the Division of Administration.

Writes Dodd, in his memoirs entitled Peapatch Politics: The Earl Long Era in Louisiana Politics:

"As a teacher, I had taught her how to speak; as a legislator, I had gotten her a scholarship that gave her a college education ; and as lieutenant governor, I had found her a big job in our administration. She was a wonderful speaker and a good administrator, but she must have been a born ingrate." The latter remark referred to Mrs. Parker having undercut Dodd in his gubernatorial campaigns of 1951-1952 and again in 1959.