According to the Kentucky Birth Index, Beatrice Parks was born in Louisville, KY, the daughter of Birdie Lee Clayton Parks and Robert Parks, Sr. In her obituary and other references, Beatrice Parks' birth location has also been given as Greenville, GA. The family did live in Georgia, according to the 1920 U.S. Census.

Beatrice Parks was a 1940 graduate of the Grady Memorial Hospital Municipal Training School for Colored Nurses in Atlanta, GA. She returned to Louisville where she was a public health nurse. She then completed two years of service as a Army Public Health Nurse within the Army Nurse Corps (ANC), and was the only African American. She did her basic training at Fort Huachuca, AZ, and was a nurse at the Station Hospital.

Beatrice Parks was commissioned a second lieutenant in October of 1942. Two and a half years later, in March of 1945, she was commissioned a first lieutenant and was promoted to supervisor of the medical wards.

After her military service, Beatrice Parks returned to Louisville, KY, and in 1946 she was a nurse at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center. She would become the wife of George T. Cooper from Mobile, AL. The couple married November 9, 1950, in Indiana. Beatrice Parks was retired from nursing when she died in Louisville in 1995. She is buried at Green Meadows Memorial Cemetery.

*This entry was suggested by researcher Gail Bushrod.

Sources: Grady Hospital School of Nursing Records, 1898-1982 @ Georgia State University; "Silver Bars," The Apache Sentinel, 04/06/1945, p.6; Caron's Louisville (Jefferson County, KY.) City Directory, 1960, p.187; Indiana Marriages (Ancestry); "Louisville Area Deaths: Beatrice P. Cooper," The Courier-Journal, 01/22/1995, p.B7; Beatrice Parks Cooper at Find A Grave.