Earlier this week, it was uncovered that Sandy Parker died several years ago and sadly, her death went unnoticed.
Parker became the first Black woman to hold a major championship in the industry when she won the All Japan Women’s WWWA title (the famed “red belt”) in 1973.
Born Casaundria Jolene Parker on November 1, 1944, Parker attended wrestling matches before setting her sights on her own involvement in the industry.
This took her to Detroit where she trained at Lou Klein’s gym alongside teachers Lucille Dupree, Mary Jane Mull, and Linda Klein and debuted for The Sheik (Ed Farhat) in Big Time Wrestling in 1968.
Parker traveled to wrestle in Championship Wrestling from Florida, Central States, Jim Crockett Promotions, and the WWWF during her first years in the industry. She would travel abroad to Australia, Malaysia, Hong Kong, and Japan.
Parker’s first championship was the NWA women’s tag titles with Susan Green, which the pair won in November 1971 in Honolulu, Hawaii, and lost the titles back to Donna Christianello & Toni Rose.
A bond was formed with powerbroker Lillian Ellison a.k.a. Fabulous Moolah and Parker was tied to her syndicate for multiple years before going their separate ways. Parker, who was openly gay, felt shunned by Ellison, who preferred that Parker abstain from frequenting gay bars and harming their image. Parker detailed their falling out in a 2008 interview with Jamie Hemmings at SLAM Wrestling:
She didn’t want me going to any gay bars (strict rules). Lillian was two-faced because she had her own little dalliances that we knew about. And so as far as I’m concerned and I told her, “Lillian if I want to go, I’m going to go.” If I’m out working, I’d do what she told me to do, but if I’m at home, on my own time, I do my own thing.
Parker relocated to California and became affiliated with Mildred Burke opening the door to Japan where she had her greatest success.
While wrestling for All Japan Women, Parker became an eight-time WWWA tag champion with partners Masked Lee, Jean Antone, and Betty Niccoli. Parker’s first championships were won with Lee on May 13, 1973, when the duo beat Mariko Akagi & Yoshiko Miyamoto. Over the next fourteen months, she held the titles seven more times and lost them for the final time on August 5, 1974, with Niccoli to Akagi & Miyamoto.
After All Japan Women, she toured with IWE in Japan including tag matches teaming with Fabulous Moolah.
In 1977, she challenged Mariko Akagi for the WWWA Championship and lost to the champion in Chiba.
Parker stayed attached to the industry and was a frequent attendee at the Cauliflower Alley Club reunions and was honored with its Ladies Award in April 2004.
Back in 2021, she was mistakenly included by WWE in a video package to honor Ethel Johnson at that year’s Hall of Fame ceremony. The company was adding Johnson to its legacy wing of the Hall of Fame and erroneously included footage of Parker in the highlight package.
In June 2022, Parker was admitted to the University Medical Center in Las Vegas and died before the end of the month at age 77.
It was not discovered until recently through historian Craig Bergstrom that Parker had died and relayed the information to Greg Oliver at SLAM Wrestling, who broke the news this past week.