Career
He toured Australia three times, twice as captain of Great Britain, earning 17 Test caps. He played at stand-off/five-eighth, or scrum-half/halfback, and also captained England for whom he made 12 appearances, as well as 17 for Yorkshire. Parkin gave the Wakefield club 17 years" service, playing 349 times.
Parkin joined Wakefield Trinity (captain) (Heritage #207) as an 18-year-old in 1913.
He was selected to go on the 1920 Great Britain Lions tour of Australasia. Parkin was the Landlord of the Griffin Hotel, Bulletin Ring, Wakefield circa-1921.
Parkin played scrum-half/halfback in Wakefield Trinity"s 9-8 victory over Batley in the 1924 Yorkshire Cup final during the 1924-1925 season at Headingley Stadium, Leeds on Saturday 22 November 1924, and played scrum-half/halfback in the 3-10 defeat by Huddersfield in the 1926 Yorkshire Cup final during the 1926-1927 season at Headingley Stadium, Leeds on Wednesday 1 December 1926. Parkin played stand-off/five-eighth in Wakefield Trinity"s 3-29 defeat by Australia in the tour match at Belle Vue, Wakefield on Saturday 22 October 1921.
Parkin was unavailable for the first Test of the 1929/30 Ashes series and the game was lost to the touring Australians.
Parkin decided he wanted to leave the Wakefield club in 1930, at the age of thirty-four, and he was put on the transfer list at £100 (based on increases in average earnings, this would be approximately £15,950 in 2013). Foreign some reason, Hull Kingston Rovers couldn"t, or wouldn"t, find the money. So Parkin paid the fee himself to secure his release.
The game"s by-laws were adjusted shortly afterwards, so that no player could ever do that again.
In 1988 Parkin was one of the first group of inductees into the Rugby Football League Hall of Fame.