Peter Cooper

“ Cooper added something every year to its resources, until his entire gift to the public amounted to about two millions of dollars.
Peter Cooper lived to the great age of ninety-two. No face in New York was more familiar to the people, and surely none was so welcome to them as the benign, placid, beaming countenance of "Old Peter Cooper." The roughest cartman, the most reckless hack driver would draw up his horses and wait without a word of impatience, if it was Peter Cooper's quaint old gig that blocked the way. ”

“ No, he was simply Peter Cooper, a man ninety-two years old, and the best loved man in America.
Had he given money?
Yes, but other men in our country do that
[123] Had he traveled abroad, and so become widely known?
No, he would never go to Europe because he wished to use his money in a different way.
Why, then, was he loved by so many?
One of the New York papers gave this truthful answer:
"Peter Cooper went through his long life as gentle as a sweet woman, as kind as a good mother, as honest as a man could live, and remain human." ”

“ Peter Cooper, like Washington, Lafayette, and Franklin, still speaks “words of truth and soberness.” He shakes hands with every aspiring young man, saying: “My son, I will help you;” with every young woman who cherishes a high ambition: “My daughter, I have a deep sympathy with you.” ”

“ Here in New York, also, Peter Cooper established the first institution intended to provide instruction to all ambitious youth—an institution that has been imitated in almost every city of the Union, although no city of the Union has ever had a citizen more esteemed or better beloved than was Peter Cooper here in New York. It is not in 'a city of kites and crows' that men of Peter Cooper's character choose to dwell; it is not in 'a city of kites and crows' that men of Peter Cooper's character are cherished and revered. ”

“ In the year Eighteen Hundred Thirty-one, when Peter Cooper was forty years old, he was worth fifty thousand dollars; when he was forty-five, he was worth a hundred thousand dollars; when he was fifty, he was worth more than two hundred thousand dollars. He was one of the richest men of New York, and he was a man of influence. Had he centered on money-making, he might have become the richest man in America.
He held political office that he might serve the people, not that he might serve a party or himself. In all deliberative bodies, the actual work is done by a few. ”

“ I believe that Peter Cooper is the only man among them who is sincerely your friend. As to Field, I have as little faith in him as I have in F.O.J. Smith. If you could get Cooper to take a stand in favor of the faithful observance of the contract for connection with the N.E. Union Line at Boston, he can put an end to all trouble, if, at the same time, he will refuse to concur in a further extension of their lines South. ”

“ If we seek, without affectionate prejudice, [109] to discover the cause of this universal grief, affection, and admiration, we shall find, I think, that it lies chiefly in two circumstances; namely, the character of Peter Cooper as a lover of his kind, and the opportunity afforded him by his long life, not only to prove that character, but to become personally known to many thousands of those whom he sought unselfishly to serve. ”

“ And through his stupendous “Union,” and “Science” and “Art” imposition, he has cheated the New York Common Council into voting him a reduction of $8,000 worth of taxes on his building. There never was such a cunning wretch as Peter Cooper, whose craft would make the devil himself blush. Through his pretended love of his species, and his spurious earnest regard for the culture of the youth of the present and of coming generations, he has foisted the merest old granny that ever existed on the noble Metropolis as Mayor ”

“ Peter Cooper has long bamboozled this city and country with his bogus philanthropy. He has not, and never will surrender his right, nor that of his heirs, to the building bearing the imposing inscription of “Union” and “To Science and Art.” He will let the first four stories, and pocket the rent, but the fifth story being (like the upper story of the Wall street buildings,) almost valueless, and which he could [10] hardly let at all, he designs devoting to human learning, by letting it to itinerating lecturers for as much as he can squeeze out of them, and put that in his pocket also. ”

“ In 1720 an Obadiah of the next generation followed, and of his son John, born in 1755, Peter Cooper was the fifth child.
John Cooper came of age in the year of the Declaration of Independence. In the [2] issue between the British government and the American colonies his choice could not be doubtful. He followed the traditions of his family. Indeed, it is now well established and universally admitted that the patriots of the American Revolution were not in fact arrayed against England. ”

“ Cooper Union, at the upper end of the Bowery, was built in 1854. Peter Cooper, merchant and philanthropist, made the object of his life the establishment of an institution designed especially to give the working [Pg 165] classes opportunity for self-education better than the existing institutions afforded. His store was on the site of the present building, which he founded. By a deed executed in 1859 the institution, with its incomes, he devoted to the instruction and improvement of the people of the United States forever. ”

“ The good old man is gone. We shall never see his snowy locks again, nor his placid countenance, nor his old horse and gig jogging by. Peter Cooper is dead!"
He had breathed his last about three o'clock that [Pg 314] morning, after the newspapers had gone to press; but the tidings spread with strange rapidity. When I went out of the house two hours later, the whole city seemed hung with flags at half-mast; for there is probably no city in the world which has so much patriotic bunting at command as New York. ”

“ This experience it was which gave form to the aspirations and purposes of Peter Cooper. As an apprentice, he resolved to do something for the benefit of apprentices—to found some institution [xiii] which should supplement the deficiencies of early education, furnishing to virtuous, industrious, and ambitious youths the means of progress, and attracting the thoughtless or indolent into the same ascending road. ”

“ In many respects the industrial conditions under which Peter Cooper began his career had been revolutionized before he finished it. The apprentice system has well-nigh passed away; and the old freedom with which an intelligent, industrious, and ambitious young man could turn from one occupation to another, seeking that road which offered greatest promise of preferment, is greatly hampered by the modern regime of "organized labor," which, whatever its advantages, presents its own peculiar perils for the workingman. ”

“ In consequence of this restriction Peter Cooper grew to manhood with very little learning beyond reading, writing, and the rudiments of arithmetic, and while this was a source of regret to him all his life, it was in reality the spur that drove him to found an institution that should take away all excuses for ignorance from the coming generations of poor boys in his native city. ”

“ He was, successively, laborer, clerk, mechanic, inventor, manufacturer, financier, teacher, philanthropist and philosopher.
If Robert Owen was the world's first modern merchant, Peter Cooper was America's first businessman. He seems to have been the first prominent man in the United States to abandon that legal wheeze, "Caveat emptor." In fact, he worked for the buyer, and considered the other man's interests before he did his own. He practised the Golden Rule and made it pay, while the most of us yet regard it as a kind of interesting experiment. ”

“ What Peter Cooper said of himself as an apprentice was true of the typical young American of his time: "I was always [x] planning and contriving, and was never satisfied unless I was doing something difficult—something that had never been done before, if possible."
3. The new freedom and the vast opportunity presented in the young republic encouraged, to a degree not paralleled before or since, that change of occupation which, with all its drawbacks, had the one great merit that it educated men to various activities. ”

“ A what-not education may be impressive, but is worthless as collateral. The achievements of Peter Cooper make the average successful man look like a pigmy.
What the world needs is a few more Peter Coopers—rich men who do not absolve themselves by drawing checks for charity, but who give their lives for human betterment.
Let us catch up with Peter Cooper. [Pg 236]
John Cooper, the father of Peter Cooper, was of English stock. ”

“ Few persons except military commanders have such an opportunity. The philanthropists who labor in secret, no matter with what noble motive, and do not come face to face with their beneficiaries, may win the applause of posterity, but cannot expect to receive the immediate and personal affection of their contemporaries. Least of all do posthumous gifts arouse this sentiment. Peter Cooper, above all other claims to renown and gratitude, identified himself with his philanthropy, and was known where he was loved. ”

“ Altogether, the assets of Cooper Union are now above two million dollars.
The ideal man in the mind of Peter Cooper was Benjamin Franklin. He wanted to help the apprentice—the poor boy. He saw many young men dissipating their energies at saloons and other unprofitable places. If he could provide a place where these young men could find entertainment and opportunity to improve their [Pg 258] minds, it would be a great gain. Peter Cooper thought that we are educated through the sense of curiosity quite as much as in reading books. ”

“ A discouraged man is defeated before he begins. When a boy, Peter Cooper had few school privileges. His father being a hatter, he was set to work pulling the hair from rabbit skins to obtain material with which to make hats. His health was poor and though having but “half a chance,” at seventeen he resolved to work for himself. At this time he was living at Peekskill. Thence he went to New York, where he apprenticed himself to a carriage-maker for five years for board and two dollars a month. He had neither time nor money for what the world calls pleasure, but he had the pleasure of hope. ”

“ Peter's mind dwelt on his own youthful form coupled with the smiling graces of Patty Steele.
"Yes! they are as handsome as they are good!" replied his master. "I remember now, when our Speaker took his third wife, the world said that they were as pretty a couple as there was at court. But my Emma and the earl will be a much finer pair. Oh! Peter Johnson; they are young, and rich, and beloved; but, after all, it avails but little if they be not good."
"Good!" cried the steward in astonishment; "they are as good as angels." ”

“ Pigeonswing had told him of the fate of the last, as well as of the eagerness with which the band had set out in quest of more white scalps.
“Peter, we can count on you for a friend, I hope?” said the bee-hunter, as the two were about to part, on the bank of the river. “I fear you were, once, our enemy!”
“Bourdon,” said Peter, with dignity, and speaking in the language of his own people, “listen. There are Good Spirits, and there are Bad Spirits. Our traditions tell us this. Our own minds tell us this, too. For twenty winters a Bad Spirit has been whispering in my ear. ”

“ Peter was artful, and practised in all the wiles of managing men, but he submitted to use his means to attain a great end. The virtual extinction of the white race was his object, and in order to effect it, there was little he would have hesitated to do. Now, however, when for the first time in many years a glimmering of human feeling was shining on the darkness of his mind, he found himself unexpectedly opposed by one of those whom he had formerly found so difficult to persuade into his own dire plans! Had that one been a chief of any renown, the circumstances would have been more tolerable ”

“ This rapid movement and his attack at Germantown first led observers like Frederick the Great to recognize his military genius. Peter Cooper failed in making hats, failed as a cabinet maker, locomotive builder and grocer, but as often as he failed he tried and tried again until he could stand upon his 123feet alone, then crowned his victory by giving a million dollars to help poor boys in time to come. ”

“ Peter Cooper doubtless often lingered in these museums, receiving the inspiration which came from visions of a world much wider than his individual horizon, from the curious and wonderful works of nature, and from the works of man in former times and in foreign lands. ”

“ That Jacopo hath an eye and a scowl that would betray him, were he chosen to the chair of St. Peter! But doff thy mask, Signor Roderigo, that the sea-air may cool thy cheek; 'tis time there should no longer be this suspicion between old and tried friends."
"My duty to those that send me forbid the liberty, else would I gladly stand face to face with thee, Master Stefano."
"Well, notwithstanding thy caution, cunning Signore, I would hazard ten of the sequins thou art to pay to me, that I will go on the morrow into the crowd of San Marco, and challenge thee openly, by name, among a thousand. ”

“ The poorest man with a hod on his shoulder carrying brick up a wall begrudged not the philanthropist his carriage as he rode by. No one put the torch to Peter Cooper's glue factory. When on some great popular occasion the masses assembled in the hall of Cooper Institute and its founder came on the platform, there were many hard hands that clapped in vigorous applause. Let the rich stretch forth [pg 356] toward the great masses of England, Ireland, and America as generous and kind a hand as that of Peter Cooper, and the age of dynamite will end. ”