M. Franklin Parrish is a native Hoosier by origin, having been raised from childhood in Decatur, Indiana. The author grew up in a home originally built in 1850 and was owned by his Great Grandfather prior to the Civil War. Mr. Parrish is a graduate with high distinction and departmental honors in both Political Science and History from the Indiana University College of Arts and Sciences (1972), elected to the Gamma Chapter of Phi Beta Kappa (1972), and holds a Doctor of Jurisprudence Degree from the Indiana University School of Law (1975) in Bloomington, Indiana.

Prior to moving to the San Francisco Bay Area, in 1982, the author was a Trust Officer for The Fort Wayne National Bank, and a Director Of Estate Planning for The Lincoln National Corporation in Fort Wayne, Indiana. Mr. Parrish is married to Lorraine W. Parrish, his lifetime companion of five decades. They met as undergraduates at Indiana University, where Lorraine was purposing a degree in concert piano. Mr. and Mrs. Parrish have a son, Dr. James Myles F. Parrish, in Coral Gables, Florida, and a daughter, Mrs. Elizabeth Parrish Stasny, an attorney in San Diego, California.

In addition to maintaining an active estate planning law practice, Mr. Parrish has continued to pursue his first love of American history and to study its impact on our daily lives. This special avocation, inspired by a lifetime of memories imparted to him by his late Father, The Honorable Myles F. Parrish, led the author to pen “BROTHERS FOR LIFE”.