Harry Cooper 1912-2010

Dear friends,

This is Kim, Barbara and Harry’s eldest grandchild, with some sad news to share.

Our beloved Harry Cooper died peacefully just after midnight on October 22, 2010, aged 98. He is survived by his wife of 73 years, Barbara, and by his grandchildren Harrison, Robin, Dylan, Morgan, Chinta, Spring and Kim.

He had been slowing down in recent months and sleeping a great deal, but even at the end he was still our sweet Harry. His last words were to tell a young woman who was looking after him on the night shift that she was a good nurse. When she checked on him a few minutes later, he had stopped breathing.

My grandma Barbara is a very strong woman, and although she misses her sweetheart very much, she is bearing up well and is coming to peace with her great loss.

The OGs’ website has always been a place for Cutie’s and Pop Pop’s individual insights, as well as for the magical chemistry that they had together. It won’t be the same without Pop Pop, but this is still their home on the web, and a place where Cutie can continue to shine. She is planning to stay busy, and hopes you’ll stay tuned to her ongoing adventures, wherever they may take her.

We’d like to share with you a passage from Harry’s funeral service, from Chapter 2 of the Bhagavad-gita, a philosophical book which he enjoyed discussing during the last year of his life. We hope that this will bring each of you some peace in the losses that all living things must endure, as it has brought peace to our family in our time of loss. We still feel Harry’s kind spirit all around us, and thank you for making a place for him in your life, and for caring about him.

CHAPTER II – BHAGAVAD-GITA (translated by W.Q. Judge)

Dear friends,

This is Kim, Barbara and Harry’s eldest grandchild, with some sad news to share.

Our beloved Harry Cooper died peacefully just after midnight on October 22, 2010, aged 98. He is survived by his wife of 73 years, Barbara, and by his grandchildren Harrison, Robin, Dylan, Morgan, Chinta, Spring and Kim.

He had been slowing down in recent months and sleeping a great deal, but even at the end he was still our sweet Harry. His last words were to tell a young woman who was looking after him on the night shift that she was a good nurse. When she checked on him a few minutes later, he had stopped breathing.

My grandma Barbara is a very strong woman, and although she misses her sweetheart very much, she is bearing up well and is coming to peace with her great loss.

The OGs’ website has always been a place for Cutie’s and Pop Pop’s individual insights, as well as for the magical chemistry that they had together. It won’t be the same without Pop Pop, but this is still their home on the web, and a place where Cutie can continue to shine. She is planning to stay busy, and hopes you’ll stay tuned to her ongoing adventures, wherever they may take her.

We’d like to share with you a passage from Harry’s funeral service, from Chapter 2 of the Bhagavad-gita, a philosophical book which he enjoyed discussing during the last year of his life. We hope that this will bring each of you some peace in the losses that all living things must endure, as it has brought peace to our family in our time of loss. We still feel Harry’s kind spirit all around us, and thank you for making a place for him in your life, and for caring about him.

CHAPTER II – BHAGAVAD-GITA (translated by W.Q. Judge)

“Those who are wise in spiritual things grieve neither for the dead nor for the living. I myself never was not, nor thou, nor all the princes of the earth; nor shall we ever hereafter cease to be. As the lord of this mortal frame experienceth therein infancy, youth, and old age, so in future incarnations will it meet the same. One who is confirmed in this belief is not disturbed by anything that may come to pass. The senses, moving toward their appropriate objects, are producers of heat and cold, pleasure and pain, which come and go and are brief and changeable; these do thou endure, O son of Bharata! For the wise man, whom these disturb not and to whom pain and pleasure are the same, is fitted for immortality. There is no existence for that which does not exist, nor is there any non-existence for what exists. By those who see the truth and look into the principles of things, the ultimate characteristic of these both is seen. Learn that He by whom all things were formed is incorruptible, and that no one is able to effect the destruction of IT which is inexhaustible. These finite bodies, which envelop the souls inhabiting them, are said to belong to Him, the eternal, the indestructible, unprovable Spirit, who is in the body: wherefore, O Arjuna, resolve to fight. The man who believeth that it is this Spirit which killeth, and he who thinketh that it may be destroyed, are both alike deceived; for it neither killeth nor is it killed. It is not a thing of which a man may say, ‘It hath been, it is about to be, or is to be hereafter’; for it is without birth and meeteth not death; it is ancient, constant, and eternal, and is not slain when this its mortal frame is destroyed. How can the man who believeth that it is incorruptible, eternal, inexhaustible, and without birth, think that it can either kill or cause to be killed? As a man throweth away old garments and putteth on new, even so the dweller in the body, having quitted its old mortal frames, entereth into others which are new. The weapon divideth it not, the fire burneth it not, the water corrupteth it not, the wind drieth it not away; for it is indivisible, inconsumable, incorruptible, and is not to be dried away: it is eternal, universal, permanent, immovable; it is invisible, inconceivable, and unalterable; therefore, knowing it to be thus, thou shouldst not grieve. But whether thou believest it to be of eternal birth and duration, or that it dieth with the body, still thou hast no cause to lament it. Death is certain to all things which are born, and rebirth to all mortals; wherefore it doth not behoove thee to grieve about the inevitable. The antenatal state of beings is unknown; the middle state is evident; and their state after death is not to be discovered. What in this is there to lament? Some regard the indwelling spirit as a wonder, whilst some speak and others hear of it with astonishment; but no one realizes it, although he may have heard it described. This spirit can never be destroyed in the mortal frame which it inhabiteth, hence it is unworthy for thee to be troubled for all these mortals.”

Should friends desire, a memorial contribution may be made to City of Hope, the charity for which Harry and Barbara volunteered for many years.