Tulare County Biographies

REV. J. R. COOPER

Transcribed by Kathy Sedler

This file is part of the California Genealogy & History Archives
http://www.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~cagha/index.htm


On a farm in Perry county, Ill., fifty-five miles from St. Louis, was born J. R. 
Cooper. He was graduated from Monmouth College in 1877 and eventually entered 
the ministry of the Presbyterian church and now lives near Dinuba, Tulare 
county, Cal., on rural free delivery route No. 2. His parents were Hugh and 
Eliza (Despar) Cooper, natives respectively of South Carolina and of Kentucky, 
and he was reared to manhood amid the healthful surroundings of an Illinois 
farm. His great-grandfather was a soldier in the Revolutionary war. Mr. Cooper 
began his ministry at Solomon, Kansas, and labored there five years; his next 
pastorate, one of four years, was at Lake City, Colorado, eight thousand six 
hundred (8600) feet above the sea level. Then he was stationed briefly in 
Nebraska ; then, for three years, at Aztec, San Juan county, New Mexico. Next he 
labored a year near the Mexican border, with headquarters at Douglas, Arizona. 
From this last station he came to Tulare county and bought forty acres of land. 
He has thirty acres in vines and six acres planted to trees and grows six acres 
of Grand Duke and Hungarian plums which bring a high price in the market. He has 
planted five acres to Rosaki grapes for shipping purposes and has installed a 
pumping plant with a four horse-power Holliday engine, by means of which he 
raises water from a depth of seventy-five feet for irrigation and domestic 
purposes, in such volume that one hundred and fifty gallons a minute may be 
discharged. Mr. Cooper's many friends are glad to be able to testify that he is 
making a distinct success of his venture in central California.
The lady who became Mrs. Cooper is of Scotch ancestry and was born at Ballymena, 
Ireland. They have a daughter, Jessie E., who was graduated from the Dinuba high 
school and has been teaching five years. The mother, who was Margaret 
(McPherson) Steel, came comparatively young to the United States, was educated 
at the St. Louis Normal school and for some time was a teacher at a yearly 
salary of $1000. Her nephews, Mathew and Richard Steel, graduates of the 
University of New York and Edinburg (Scotland) University respectively, have won 
prominence, the one as a professor of chemistry, the other as a physician in the 
Indian service. Mr. Cooper is a Republican and a citizen of notable public 
spirit.
 
History of Tulare and Kings Counties, California with Biographical Sketches - 
Los Angeles, Calif., Historic Record Company, 1913, pp. 730-731