Page 47 - Jefferson County AR 1889 History (Goodspeed)

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HISTORY O F ARKANSAS.
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and Elizabeth King. He has been occupied all j He now owns 700 acre8 of very productive land,

his life i a tilling the soil, is the owner of about j and a t one time had control of Cooper's Island,

seventy acres of land, and has about sixty-five . having pnrchased it for 880.000, but a number of

acres under cnltivation. He ia also engaged in . very disastrous floods destroyed it. On Angnst

running a grist mill and a cotton gin. He be- 1 22, 1849. he was mamed to Miss Ann Kent. of

Ilongs to the Masonic fraternity, and during the Tipton Counby, Tmn., a daughter of George W.

three years of his membership he has filled the Kent, who was very prominent in that, county.

offlce of tyler of the lodge. He is a member and This lady was born May 20, 1833, and died April

has held the office of treasurer in the Agricultural ; IS, 1872, and by her marriage with Mr. Cooper be-

Wheel for one term. He and wife belong to the , came the mother of twelve children, oi whom four

Methodist Church, and both are act.ive church are yet living: Bob S., Frances V. (wife of a Mr.

workers. He has a t this time sold out in Jefferson Neely, of Mississippi County, Ark.), Mary F. and

Connty, Ark., and has bought a 160-acre farm in , Willie. I n 1875 he was married to Miss Mary

/Conway County, Ark., paying $1,500 cash for same, Kent, a sister of his drst wife, this lady having

'and has other property to the amount of $2,5C0, i been born in Virginia, on April 21, 1829, and died

and is entirely clear of debt. His postoffice after February 15, 1881. Mr. Cooper is a member of

January 1, 1890, will be Apringfield,Conway Coun- the Methodist Episcopal Church. South, of which

ty, Ark. he is trustee, and in politics he is a stanch Demo-
IOarrett Cooper, one of the oldest and most re- crat. He is now sixty-three yeam of age, but to
Ispected citizens of Jefferson County, was boru in- look at him, no one wonld think he was more than

Craven County, N. C., on April 26. 1826,and is a , fifty. He m s noglasses, nor does he ever expect

ison of Robert and Isabel (Prescott) Cooper. The : to, remarking tbat "I wonld trade my eyes for

parents moved from North Carolina to Tennessee none." During the war he was neutral and con-
in 1828, and settled in.Tiptou County, where Gar-' sequently excused irom service, but he traveled

1rett was reared and educated. Both parents died over the country a great deal, and was never mo.

at an advnnced ago. I n his early youth, Garrett lested by eithev side. Mr. Cooper can be proud

Idisplayed a fondness for mechanical pursuits that I of one fact, and that is that dnring his life he was

predicted a brilliant futnre, and when only eighteen never arrestad for any cause whatsoever. He is a

or nineteen years of age he received a contraat to leader in public and private enterprises, and one

build several bridges in the State of Tennessee. of the foremost citizens in the oonnty. His popn-

From that time to the year 1860 he contracted larity is unbounded, and few men are held in

throughout the State for building bridges, cotton higher esteem.

gins and other structures, and his fame as such John D. Crockett, book-keeper anrl manager of

spread rapidly to the surrounding country. Prob. Col. John M. Gracie's cotton plantation in Bogy

/ably no other scientific mechanic in tbat part of Township, Jefferson County, was born in Arkansas

the country enjoyed the reputation that young County, near Crockett's Bluffs, on the White River,

;Cooper had made for himself. Science wasa study on Angust 1, 1858, and is a son of David and

!to which he had applied himself all his life, it was i Nancy Crockett. The father was a very success-

natnral to him, and in the oonstruction of bridges, ful farmer dnring his life, but a considerable loser

he had few superiors even among the older mechan- by the Civil War. At the time of his death, he

ica. I n 1866 he embarked in mercantile life at had not sncceaded.in recovering much of his for-

what was known as Lower Seven Lake, and after- tune, and was in only comparatively easy circum-

ward Cooper Landing, named in his honor when stances. He was prominent in Xasouic ciroles

the p~stofficewas established at that point. Ha and a noted Democratic politician, his favor being

continued in bnsiness until very recently, and from I sought for by h n n d d s of men during his life-

1866 began to cultivate cotton quite extensively. I time. Two years of his life he gave to the South

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