For those of you who may not know Cooper as well as others, let's take a few moments to explore some of the details of our adventurer's life.
The fifth of six children (he has three brothers and two sisters), Cooper lives with his mom and dad, his younger sister, Kaeli, and his older brother, Sullivan, on a 27 acre farm in the wee western tip of Perry County, PA, on Tuscarora Mountain.
Sequestered in the quiet Horse Valley, Tuscacheague Mountain Farm is not only host to five two-legged animals but also to an array of four-legged ones, including three horses, a goat, a rabbit, nine cats and a white German Shepherd named Sadie-Mae.
Cooper was a Boy Scout for many of his boyhood years. Living in the same home in which his mother was raised -- a home which had been in the (Whiskeyman) family since 1962 -- he attended the Warwick School District (Lititz, PA: Lancaster County) prior to moving with his family to the Fannett-Metal School District on Halloween day, 2007. Cooper was homeschooled five years, from third through seventh grades.
Overcoming early (mis-)diagnoses including profound deafness and severe autism, Cooper has come to excell academically. He did not speak until age four, at which time he began to speak in full sentences. Yes, it was quite a shocker for his family, especially since, through the Schreiber Pediatric Center in Rohrerstown, PA (formerly Easter Seals), he had begun to learn sign language!
Cooper, in fact, had rather severe lead poisoning, it was soon discovered.
Today Coop is a healthy seventeen year old Star Trek fan who enjoys playing chess and participating in drama club. He is artistically inclined, having achieved recognition in the Scholastic Art competition; he placed in the Franklin County Science Fair (winning $250.00); and won an essay contest (cash prize and a medal) on patriotism.
Last Spring, Cooper enjoyed playing the part of the Preacher in his high school production of Thar's A Feudin' Over Yonder.
Cooper has four nephews. His dad works for Bosch Security Systems, his mom fancies herself a future novelist (sci-fantasy genre) and poet, and his brother Sullivan attends as a freshman at Seton Hill University in Greensburg, PA.
A large, extended family surrounds Cooper; his mom was the youngest of nine siblings and his dad one of five children. His family tree carries many names both in its roots and along its variant branches: Bard, Whiskeyman, Ellmaker, Collins, Sissler, Funk, Finch, Saunders, King, Gregory, Callahan, Rhodes, Houck.
Cooper is named for a character in the book, Walk Across America, by Peter Jenkins, which his mom read and enjoyed when she herself was a college student at Seton Hill University.
But that is all he is likely to volunteer about the character for which he was so fondly named.
