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The family seems widespread.  Someone made a comment about how the wealthier families had better survival chances than poorer families and it seems to be true in some cases.  Looking at male DNA it certainly seems that surnames have multiple male lineages under the same surname.  Obviously very easy to understand in many cases, lots of Johns, Peters and Richards etc had sons when surnames came into common use.  Similarly there were plenty of Smiths, Wrights, Masons and Turners (wood) and plenty of place name, geographical features etc.  However even Clan names can have men with Celtic, Slavic and Scandinavian or Germanic lines because many men took on the Clan leaders surname, even if they just worked on the land etc, they were not extended families.  Parkinson's do seem to have owned a lot of land though and land ownership is one of those tangible links to wealth and power when there is a record of a powerful person of that name being granted the land.  I would love there to be name study for Parkinson men to see what lines they had.  Ours is definitely Norman but I can't see any evidence that it is the same line as Featherstonhough and the first ones on their name study are a known Norman line haplogroup J.  I also wonder why someone would ditch the powerfully connected family name.  I wonder if young Perkin were not a powerful persons illegitimate son being raised in the Featherstonhough household.  Without lots of males testing we won't know the answer.   

I didn't know Cecil Parkinson was born in Carnforth.  That's interesting.  We are up to Y700 on our Parkinson line and very few people have tested which is frustrating.  A Y67 match with Ancestry back to Sowerby has his Ancestor listed as a 'Gentleman Goldsmith' in Parish Records. He is also a remote autosomal cousin match. My Ancestor at the time on the Parkinson line was an Ostler at the village inn in Woodplumpton indicating there was a drop in social status for some Parkinsons, probably younger sons of younger sons.

I am actually at a crossroads in the 1700's unsure if my closest branch goes to Cockerham and Ashton Hall or West.  I have another Parkinson in Kirkham who is a 4th grandfather on another line but still on my grandfathers branch of the family tree.  I have a third who was just a stepmother and a fourth is on my fathers side in Bolton but that line goes back to Fairsnape. 

I guess the mystery is who was 'Perkin's son' to inherit such a vast amount of land?  Are all these Parkinson Families connected and who do they go back to?  It doesn't appear to be the Featherstonehough's as suggested in the book about Parkinsons. Incidentally, the Y700 shows the line was in Belgium in 350 a.d then we jump forward to a Y700 match in the South of England who my cousin is linked to in 1150, unsurprisingly his surname is different, it's too far back.  We really need more testers. 

 However his YDNA is T so he is kind of rare, he is Crew and doesn't even have any YDNA 12 matches.  It's under manual review so who knows someone may come in from 'left of the field'.
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Please feel free to join if there is no other suitable Y-DNA surname project.
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Thanks

I don't know how far you got with this but my son in law's name isn't that common but whether it could be classed as rare is another matter.  However his YDNA is T so he is kind of rare, he is Crew and doesn't even have any YDNA 12 matches.  It's under manual review so who knows someone may come in from 'left of the field'.

Agnes Navarre
Born in 1615 - Foix, Dordogne, Aquitaine, France
Deceased
 
Parents
? ?
mother
Magdalene UNKNOWN
 
Spouses and children
Married to Jean Gaston, born about 1620 - Foix, France, deceased about 1670 - Caranleagh, Cloughwater, Antrim, Ireland aged about 50 years old (Parents : M ? ? &  F Olive Gaston 1578-) with
M William Gaston

Sorry it is a really long time since I used the board and I plunged straight in.  The YDNA matches for Gaston are listed on my mothers cousin David's page but I thought the person who had Gaston relatives may be interested.  Also...the other question you answered about Walton I really ought to have written down details from my tree first, I skipped to my 2nd great grandfather Thomas Walton's grandfather James and yes his father was William Walton and Alice before that were  James and Barbara.  There were a lot of Mason builders in Preston called Walton and I guess it is fair to say they may all be connected....which is great.  There were two Thomas Walton's killed in Preston and I know one was my great uncle, I think the other one was my half great uncle by his fathers first wife.  They were in Blackburn for a while, I think his first wife Elizabeth Jones may have died in childbirth and her family were helping with the children.  The baby died after a brief life as well.  Just one surviving boy and a girl from their marriage then one surviving boy from his second marriage who was my great grandfather who had no grandsons via his sons.  I may follow some of the other Mason families back to see if I can link to a common ancestor then move forward to see if I can find living male distant cousins. All the other three great grandfathers have different YDNA lines and I feel eaten up with curiosity about the 4th.  Regards Linda