William Cooper (judge)
William Cooper (December 2, 1754 – December 22, 1809) was the founder of Cooperstown, New York and father of writer James Fenimore Cooper, who apparently used his father as the pattern for the Judge Marmaduke Temple character in his book The Pioneers.
[edit] Life
William Cooper was born in a log house in Smithfield (now Somerton, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania) just outside Philadelphia, the son of English Quaker parents, James Cooper (b. Byberry, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, 1729-1795) and Hannah (Hibbs) Cooper. He appears to have worked as a wheelwright in and around Byberry. There is no record of his attending school. On December 12, 1774, in Burlington, New Jersey, he was married by a civil magistrate to Elizabeth Fenimore, daughter of Richard Fenimore, a Quaker of Rancocas, New Jersey. When Fenimore asked how his daughter was to be supported at William's young age, William answered that he was poor and "she must shift for herself."
During the early 1780s Cooper became a storekeeper in Burlington, New Jersey, and by the end of the decade he was a successful land speculator and wealthy frontier developer in what is now Otsego County, New York. Soon after the conclusion of the Revolutionary War, he acquired a tract of land several thousand acres in extent within the borders of New York state and lying along the head waters of the Susquehanna River. He founded the Village of Otsego at the foot of Otsego Lake in 1786, and moved his family there, arriving on 10 November 1790. After Cooper's death, the village was renamed Cooperstown in his honor.
After 1791, when Otsego County was split off from Montgomery County, Cooper became county judge and later served two terms in Congress, elected as a Federalist to the 4th (March 4, 1795 – March 3, 1797) and the 6th United States Congresses (March 4, 1799 – March 3, 1801).
In 1796, Cooper determined to make his home permanently in the town he had founded, which by that time promised to become a thriving settlement. He began the construction of a mansion, completed in 1799, which he named Otsego Hall, and which was for many years the manor house of his own possessions, and by far the most spacious and stately private residence in central New York.
Cooper family tradition has it that Judge Cooper was killed by a blow to the head sustained during an argument with a political opponent after a public meeting in Albany, New York on December 22, 1809, but no evidence of this can be found. The story can not be traced back to before 1897, when it was first published by a great-grandson of the judge, and is implausible. It is now believed that Judge Cooper died of natural causes.
Cooper was buried at the Episcopal Christ Churchyard in Cooperstown where his son was buried many years later.
Cooper's great-great-grandson was the writer, Paul Fenimore Cooper, whose most notable novel was the children's adventure, Tal: His Marvelous Adventures with Noom-Zor-Noom. His great-grandson, Paul F. Clark, was a Nebraska State Representative.
[edit] References
- William Cooper, How Settlements were Promoted from A Guide in the Wilderness, 1810
- James Fenimore Cooper (1858-1938, grandson of the author), William Cooper and Andrew Craig's Purchase of Croghan's Land, 1931
- Lyman H. Butterfield, Judge William Cooper (1754-1809): A Sketch of his Character and Accomplishment, October, 1949
- Lyman H. Butterfield, Cooper's Inheritance: The Otsego Country and its Founders, October, 1954.
- David M. Ellis, The Coopers and New York State Landholding Systems, October, 1954
- James H. Pickering, Cooper's Otsego Heritage: The Sources of The Pioneers, July, 1979
- Alan Taylor, Who Murdered William Cooper?, July 1991
- Alan Taylor, Who was Elizabeth Cooper?, Autumn, 1994
- Alan Taylor, William Cooper's Town: Power and Persuasion on the Frontier of the Early American Republic, New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1995
- James M. Banner, Jr., Cooper, William, from American National Biography, Oxford University Press, Inc., 2000
"Cooper, James Fenimore". Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography. 1900.- William Cooper (judge) at the Biographical Directory of the United States Congress
[edit] External links
| United States House of Representatives | ||
|---|---|---|
| Preceded by Silas Talbot |
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from New York's 10th congressional district 1795 - 1797 |
Succeeded by James Cochran |
| Preceded by James Cochran |
Member of the U.S. House of Representatives from New York's 10th congressional district 1799 - 1801 |
Succeeded by Thomas Morris |
