The Coopers, Ch. 5

These are the days when America is rapidly approaching the modern age.  Dr. Pepper Soda Pop was first served in 1885 followed by Coca Cola in 1886.  Karl Benz unveiled his first “motorwagen” and Geronimo is finally captured at Skeleton Canyon in Arizona.  The Statue of Liberty is being dedicated in New York in that same year and the following year, the United States is hit by the “Great Blizzard of ‘88” and Jack the Ripper is terrorizing London.

Although there has never been absolute proof, it is believed that the explosion of Krakatoa in Indonesia in 1883 was responsible for a worldwide mini Ice Age for the ensuing few years.  In either case, worldwide temperatures fell and winters got colder and colder until, in 1886/1887, the worst winter in recorded history took place on the great plains killing tens of thousands of cattle.  It was not a good time to be a farmer and it would be easy to assume that this is the reason two of the remaining Cooper boys, Isaac and Cornelius, left the farm.

Isaac Cooper tried his hand at farming when he returned from the war but farming was not his “cup of tea.”  The 1870 Census lists him as assistant Marshal of Mills Co. Iowa with an estate worth $3,000, a sizeable sum in those times.  He married Sarah Field Hall in 1872 and started his family at the advanced age of 34 years.  He and Sarah had three children, Charlotte, Alice, and Harry between 1873 and 1878.  The family must have left Iowa for Colorado right after the birth of Harry in 1878, because Isaac can be found fully involved Colorado land speculation in 1883.  It is reported that Isaac founded the town of Glenwood Springs, CO, naming it after his hometown of Glenwood, IA.  Isaac located Glenwood Springs  near some hot springs that had long been used by the Indians, envisioning a health resort and spa.  In 1944, Nelson Mason wrote to the county clerk of Garfield Co., Colorado and received the following information regarding Isaac Cooper.

• Isaac Cooper located part of the land that is now the City of Glenwood Springs.
• February 24, 1883 - Isaac Cooper gave a quitclaim deed to the Defiance Town and Land Company.
• April 25, 1883 - The United States of America gave a patent to William Gelder, County Judge of Garfield County, as trustee for 400 acres for town site purposes.
• June 26, 1883 - William Gelder, County Judge, gave deed to the Defiance Town and Land Company, for the town site.  (Isaac Cooper was President of the Defiance Town and Land Company).
• Later, the town of Glenwood Springs was incorporated and the Defiance Town and Land Company deeded out all the lots.
• Captain Cooper also operated a line of stages, and a toll road leading out some ten or twelve miles from Glenwood Springs.

Even though Isaac only attained the rank of lieutenant during the war, everyone called him Captain Cooper.  Isaac’s daughter, Alice, was an accomplished sculptor and was commissioned to create a life size statue of Sacagawea for the 1905 Lewis and Clark Centennial Exposition.  The statue now resides in a park in Portland Oregon.

 With all his success, Isaac passed away at the relatively young age of 48 years.  His wife Sarah never remarried and continued on in Colorado for all her remaining years, as did all the children.  In the Riverside Cemetery at Denver, in the shadow of two great elm trees and facing the Rocky Mountains to the West, six uniform granite memorials bear the following epitaphs, headed by a marble U . S. Army headstone, inscribed: "Lieut. Isaac Cooper, Co. F, 15th Iowa Infantry."  Then on the monuments:

·    Cooper, Isaac, 1839 - 1887

·    Cooper, Sarah Field, 1847 - 1929

·    Hall, Lucy Field, 1821 – 1903  [Isaac’s mother-in-law]

·    Wilson, Charlotte Cooper 1873 – 1938  [Isaac’s daughter, married John Wilson]

·    Hubbard, Alice Cooper 1875 – 1937  [Isaac’s daughter, married Nathanial Hubbard]

·    Hubbard, Nathaniel Mead, Jr., 1860 – 1939  [Alice’s husband]

Cornelius was the youngest of the Cooper boys, being almost 20 years younger than his older brother Theophilus.  Neal, as he was called, had heard stories of Theo’s exploits in the Southwest and longed to join him there for some adventures of his own.  Very little is known about Cornelius but we do know that "Neal" followed his brother Isaac to Colorado, and was the first sheriff of Garfield County, Colorado, of which Glenwood Springs is the county seat.  He then located to Arizona and worked with his older brothers, sharing their hopes and long wait for the railroad.  Like them, he never married and is buried in Silver City, New Mexico.