Gordon Cooper, a Pueblo judge for years, “was fair but a stickler for rules,” said his daughter, Camille Cooper Hastings of Pueblo.
Cooper died Friday in a care center in Pueblo. He was 85.
A service is planned at 10 am. Saturday at First United Methodist Church in Pueblo.
“He had a steel-trap mind,” said his wife, Dorothy Shaw, and could argue over football and basketball statistics until everyone else gave up.
He also could recite the libretto and sing numbers from his favorite operas.
Cooper rarely gave up on anything. His dentist, Joe Hanlin, took Cooper on his first ski trip “and he wasn’t good,” said Hanlin. “But he was strong and stubborn, and he made it all the way down from the top of Vail. I think he was scared the whole way.”
More worrisome was when Hanlin “took him jeeping. I don’t think he saw any scenery because he was so scared,” going over rocky, narrow roads. That was his last jeeping trip.
On the bench, he was “fair, thorough and competent,” said Wes Kettelkamp, a retired lawyer. “People in the courtroom felt at ease with him.”
The first time he appeared before Cooper, knowing that the judge was new, he thought, “I’ve got a pigeon here,” Kettelkamp said. “But I found out he was a lot smarter than I thought.”
Cooper loved travel, especially by car, and after retiring from the bench, he became a senior judge for 12 years, traveling by car throughout the state to hear cases in courts without a judge or to fill in for judges who were on vacation.
“The saying was, ‘You put four wheels under a Cooper, and he’s happy,’ ” said his daughter.
Gordon Cooper was born in La Plata, Mo., on July 7, 1925, and started his work career at age 12 when his father died. The family then moved to Bernice, Ind.
Cooper joined the Army at 18, serving in the infantry and earning several awards. He lost the hearing in one ear and had several shrapnel wounds.
He earned his law degree at Indiana-Purdue University in Indianapolis and was in private practice for a short time.
He became an assistant district attorney in Pueblo in 1965 and became a county court judge in 1974, serving until retiring in 1992.
He married Ruthann Wigam on June 5, 1954. She died in a car accident in 1998. He later married Dorothy Shaw.
In addition to his wife and daughter, he is survived by two stepdaughters, Cynthia Shaw Simonoff and Jessie Shaw, both of New York City; three grandchildren; his brother, Alto Rex Cooper of Silverdale, Wash.; and a sister, Loureatha Houser of Vancouver, Wash.
Virginia Culver: 303-954-1223 or vculver@denverpost.com
Other deaths
Samuel T. Cohen, 89, the physicist who invented the small tactical nuclear weapon known as the neutron bomb, a controversial device designed to kill enemy troops with subatomic particles but leave battlefields and cities relatively intact, died Sunday at his home in Los Angeles.
The cause was complications of stomach cancer, his son Paul said.
In contrast to strategic warheads, which can kill millions and level cities, the neutron bomb minimized blast and heat. Instead, it maximized a barrage of infinitesimal neutrons that could zip through tanks, buildings and other structures and kill people, usually by destroying the central nervous system, and all other life forms.
While doubters questioned the usefulness, logic and ethics of killing people and sparing property, Cohen called his bomb a “sane” and “moral” weapon that could limit death, destruction and radioactive contamination, targeting combatants while leaving civilians and towns unscathed. He insisted that many critics misunderstood or purposely misrepresented his ideas for political, economic or mercenary reasons.
A specialist in the radiological effects of nuclear weapons, he relentlessly promoted the neutron bomb for much of his life.
The New York Times
