BIOGRAPHY - ELIZABETH COOPER
Mrs.
Elizabeth Cooper is a lady most highly respected in Melvin, where she has
lived since 1892, deriving her income from a good farming property, situated
in Peach Orchard township, Ford county. Mrs. Cooper was born in Devonshire,
England, in the year 1880. There she was reared and educated and in the
early '50s emigrated to the new world, her destination being Perry, Wyoming
county. New York, where she gave her hand in marriage to William Cooper, who
was likewise a native of England, and emigrated to this country in the '50s.
Following their marriage the young couple removed to Geneseo, Henry county, Illinois, where Mr. Cooper secured employment as a clerk in a store. He also purchased a house and lot in Geneseo, and there made his home for several years, subsequent to which time he took up his abode in Livingston county, this state, where he remained for a short time and then removed to Ford county, where he purchased eighty acres of land, to which he later added an additional tract of eighty acres, which he improved and cultivated for many years. In 1892, however, he abandoned all active work and retired to Melvin, where he purchased a nice home and lived in well earned ease until the time of his death, which occurred in 1900. He gave his political support to the republican party and was called by his fellow townsmen to fill several public offices in the township. He was a man of honorable methods, straightforward in all his business dealings and his many excellent traits of character won him many friends, so that his death was the occasion of deep regret not only to the members of his household but to the people of the community in which he had lived.
By her marriage Mrs. Cooper has become the mother of seven children but one of the number is now deceased. The family record is as follows: William A., who resides in Iowa; Jennie, at home; Watson J.; Mary, the widow of George Merrit; James, who makes his home in Ford county; Eva, who has passed away; and Cora, the wife of Neal Dixon, of Ford county.
Mrs. Cooper is a devoted member of the Methodist Episcopal church at Melvin, to which her husband also belonged. She is in possession of a good farming property comprising one hundred and sixty acres left her by her husband, and from this farm she derives an income sufficient to enable her to live in well earned ease. She is a gentle, kindly woman, charitable in her estimate of every one and her many excellent traits of heart and mind have won for her the esteem and admiration of a host of warm friends.
Extracted 16 Oct 2016 by Norma Hass from History of Ford County, Illinois, From Its Earliest Settlement to 1908, author E. A. Gardner, Volume 2, pages 618-623.
