Freddy Parent, Sanford’s most accomplished baseball player, played for the St. Louis Perfectos (Cardinals), Boston Red Sox, and Chicago White Sox between 1898 and 1911. He was the Red Sox first shortstop, playing with the Americans (prelude to the Red Sox), from 1901 to 1907.
An early star in the American League, Parent enjoyed his best seasons as a professional in 1903 and 1904, when Boston won back-to-back American League pennants. In 1903, Parent posted a .304 batting average and registered career highs in triples (17, tied for fourth best in the league) and RBI’s (80, eighth best on the Circuit). In the first modern World Series in 1903 Parent out-shined the legendary Honus Wagner of the Pittsburgh Pirates, both in the field and at bat. Freddy’s twelve-year stint in the Major Leagues ended in 1911. While he struggled at times in later years, many of Parent’s peers recognized him as one of the best shortstops in the American League.
“Fred Parent is a great ballplayer who never got all the credit he deserved. He was so graceful he made hard plays look easy. I think Parent is the greatest shortstop I ever saw in starting and finishing double plays. As a runner, he excelled in breaking up the double play ball, and he was a good hitter as well. He had a great throwing arm and could peg the ball from any position as accurately as a bullet shot from a rifle. Parent was especially good at tagging out base runners when they slid.” Honus Wagner - when he selected Freddy Parent for his All American League Team in 1923.
Parent never lost his enthusiasm for baseball. The scrappy 5'5'' 148-pounder (some sources say 5'7") continued to play for and coached the Baltimore Orioles of the International League. One of his teammates was a youngster from Baltimore by the name of George Herman Ruth.
Parent played for a short time with Toronto of the International League. He also returned briefly to organized ball as player-manager with the Springfield, Massachusetts Eastern League team in 1918 and with the Lewiston, Maine team in the New England League in 1919. From 1922 to 1924, Parent was a successful head coach at Colby College, and later assisted former teammate Fred Mitchell as junior varsity coach at Harvard from 1926 to 1928. No matter where Parent played or coached, Goodall Park in Sanford was always his baseball home.
Freddy coached and played for numerous Sanford teams throughout his career, including a number of Sanford Goodall Mills semipro teams. In the 1950s he coached the Freddy Parent All-stars team, whose roster included one of the founding fathers of the Sanford Mainers, Allen Mapes. The once firebrand infielder for the Boston Americans continued to play a decent game for his town’s team, even at age 55. During a French Catholic charity game in Lewiston, Maine, the still cricket-spry Parent got his last base hit at age 72 - over sixty years after he had started playing baseball. It was one of the most rewarding moments of the proud Frenchman’s life.
After his playing days, Freddy was often seen at Goodall Park, chatting baseball with young students of the game. An avid outdoorsman who loved to hunt and fish, he spent the rest of his life in his home state. Parent dabbled in a few ventures, including owning and operating a boarding home and running a gasoline filling station for a number of years. Along with former teammate Harry Lord, he once tried to buy a minor league team in Portland. He also ran unsuccessfully for county sheriff.
As the last survivor of the 1903 World Series, and one of the last nineteenth-century players, Parent was often sought out by reporters for interviews. He proved to be a strong advocate for the Deadball Era style of play. Parent described modern players as timid and game conditions as mild in comparison to his rough-and-tumble days. "People get real excited when someone throws a paper cup or something at a player. They didn't throw those kinds of things in my days. They threw beer bottles. And they aimed at your head."/p>
Freddy Parent died on November 2, 1972, three weeks shy of his 97th birthday, in Sanford, Maine. He was buried in Saint Ignatius Cemetery.
As a youngster, Parent’s introduction to league play was in a secondary role on the Sanford town team in the late 1800s. "Everybody pretty nearly told me I was too small to play baseball and that I would never make a player anyhow." Freddy proved all his doubters wrong.
