In March of 1944, the Navy for the first time deliberately commissioned black officers. (A few had become officers before then because the Navy mistakenly believed they were white.) The change was long overdue, because by that time the service had some 120,000 African-American enlisted personnel in its ranks. The service took the step in response to political pressure from organizations such as the National Urban League and the NAACP, not because of any overwhelming desire to achieve social justice.
A special training course at Great Lakes, Illinois, produced 12 ensigns and one warrant officer. At the conclusion of the course, Chief Petty Officer George Cooper was summoned to see Commander Daniel Armstrong, who was officer in charge of training black sailors at Great Lakes. Armstrong said to him, “I don’t know what kind of an officer you’d make. In the first place, you’re what we call a hell-raiser.” Cooper protested, and Armstrong explained that the allegation went back to a fight Cooper had had with a white boy in North Carolina when he was eight years old. That was how thoroughly the FBI had screened the black sailors. The officer candidate explained, “Well, there’s nothing I can say about that, sir. If you’re aware of it, you must know the circumstances, and that’s all I can say.” A day later Cooper became one of the 12 new ensigns.
His first service as an officer was at Hampton, Virginia, site of a rate-training school for black enlisted men. One day Cooper and his wife Peg were walking down the street when a white sailor accosted him. The other man said, “You black son of a bitch, I read about you guys, but I never thought I’d meet one.” It was the only time Ensign Cooper lost his cool. He drew back to retaliate, but his wife grabbed his arm and said, “George, it’s not worth it.” He quickly agreed, and the incident passed.
That was a rare exception for an individual who had learned in many difficult ways the lessons of restraint in the face of injustice. But such was the temperament of Cooper that he chose to take a missionary approach toward white naval personnel. A number of his fellow black ensigns sought to avoid contact with those who might be unpleasant. Cooper went out of his way to seek constructive contact. He had himself appointed personnel officer for the command so that he could sit down with many of the white sailors who were stationed at Hampton. During his one-on-one meetings with individuals, he communicated by word and deed that he was a fellow human being, not just a member of a category. As more and more meetings occurred, the word spread. It was an approach he used throughout the 85-year-long life that ended in late May of this year.
George Cooper had a special gift for making friends—partly because he had such a warm disposition, partly because of his generous, giving nature, and partly to overcome the wariness and hostility he had been subjected to because his black skin. When he was growing up in the segregated town of Washington, North Carolina, his mother said to him, “Son, it ain’t no sin being colored, but it’s darned inconvenient.”
George’s father, Edward Cooper, taught him the work ethic. He talked about the value of education and the importance of producing things that had value in the marketplace. George Cooper had ten siblings, one of whom died in infancy. The ten who grew to adulthood all got college educations because their parents had stressed the absolute need for that in order to succeed in the world. And succeed they did.
In addition to his achievement as one of the first black naval officers, for example, George became the first black department head in the city government of Dayton, Ohio. The number of people he helped in his lifetime is doubtless in the thousands, because his philosophy was that no one got where he or she is in life without being aided by many others. Each person, he said, thus has a solemn obligation to pass on assistance to others so they can find their own success. There is an apt metaphor: “If you want to feed someone for a day, give him a fish. If you want to feed him for a lifetime, teach him to be a fisherman.” Many men and women became figurative fishermen because of Cooper.
I first met this remarkable human being in 1986 when I interviewed him as part of an oral history project on the Golden Thirteen, as those first black naval officers came to be called. The Navy kept them well hidden in World War II, because advancement of African- Americans was not yet the thing to do. Later, retroactively, the Navy made heroes of these men. Whereas the ensigns had no graduation ceremony in 1944, on the 50th anniversary of their commissioning they were honored at Great Lakes before an audience that included hundreds and hundreds of people. In attendance were a member of the President’s Cabinet, a four-star admiral, two vice admirals, and five rear admirals.
Over the years my family and I were often the beneficiaries of kindnesses from George and Peg. They treated us as part of their own extended family, which included many others they had befriended over the years. For us, every year since 1986 has included at least one visit to Ohio to be with the Coopers. And in many of his telephone calls George would often sign off by saying, “Take our love home to your family, and keep some for yourself.” He was that kind of man. I will miss him terribly.