Parker, Tom (Thomas Andrew) (1909–1997)

Dutch show-business manager, active in the USA from 1932. He took over the management of Elvis Presley in 1956, when Presley was becoming a national star in the USA, and continued to control the singer's affairs until after Presley's death in 1977. As manager, he took an unprecedented 50% of his client's income.

Parker first entered into a business agreement with Presley when the singer was not yet 21, and was instrumental in selling his Sun Records contract to RCA for $45,000, at the time the largest sum ever paid for such a contract. Parker's status as an illegal alien adversely affected his subsequent handling of his client's affairs; for example, he never allowed Presley to tour abroad because he himself had no passport. It was also Parker who insisted on Presley serving two years in the army at the peak of his popularity. A heavy gambler, Parker lost an estimated $1 million a year in Las Vegas casinos. In 1976 he persuaded Presley to sell his entire back catalogue to RCA for $6 million (of which half went straight to Parker), to the detriment of Presley's financial affairs. Charged by the Presley estate with mismanagement after the singer's death, Parker claimed that he could not be sued in a US court because he was not a US citizen. A settlement was reached out of court, in which he was stripped of all further connection with the Elvis Presley name.

Parker was born in Breda, North Brabant. In his early twenties, he left the Netherlands and settled in Tampa, Florida, where he assumed a false identity. In 1948 he obtained an honorary colonel's commission from the governor of Louisiana and insisted on using the title from then on.