Federal bankruptcy Judge Marcia Phillips Parsons, of Greeneville, is the new chief judge of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court for the Eastern District of Tennessee.

Parsons is the first woman in this district to hold the position of chief judge, according to a spokesman for the Eastern District.

In 1993, she marked a similar milestone when she was appointed to a newly created bankruptcy judgeship in this district.

With that appointment, she became the first woman to be named to a federal judgeship in the Eastern District of Tennessee.

Parsons at one time served as a law clerk for a U.S. magistrate, according to a news release from the District.

That was back in 1980, before the person doing legal research for a magistrate actually held the title of law clerk and before "judge" was added to the title of magistrate in 1990.

Her first exposure to the federal judiciary was in 1980, shortly after she graduated from the University of Tennessee College of Law, the news release recalled.

She was hired by Chattanooga's first full-time U.S. magistrate, Roger W Dickson, as his law clerk.

(In those early days of the full-time magistrate position, the law clerk job was designated by the U.S. Courts as clerical assistant. The title was changed to law clerk in 1987.)

Parsons left the court in 1981 and practiced law in Chattanooga and Knoxville until 1990, when she was appointed Chapter 13 Trustee for the Northern and Northeastern Divisions of the Eastern District, a position she held until being appointed to the bench.

Parsons regularly holds court here and often in Knoxville.

There are two other women serving in judgeships in this district, both in Chattanooga: U.S. Magistrate Judge Susan K. Lee, appointed in 2004, and U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Shelley Rucker, appointed in 2010.