Paul Fenimore Cooper (September 15, 1899 – January 20, 1970) was an American writer of children's books and non-fiction, some based on his travels. His first book was a translation of Albanian folk tales.

Life

Paul Fenimore Cooper was born in Albany, New York, in 1899, the son of the writer James Fenimore Cooper (1858–1938) and Susan Linn (Sage) Cooper (1866–1933). His uncle Henry M. Sage (1868–1933) became a state senator. Paul was a great-grandson of the novelist

James Fenimore Cooper James Fenimore Cooper (September 15, 1789 – September 14, 1851) was an American writer of the first half of the 19th century, whose historical romances depicting colonial and indigenous characters from the 17th to the 19th centuries brought h ...

(1789–1851) and a great-great-grandson of

William Cooper William Cooper may refer to: Business *William Cooper (accountant) (1826–1871), founder of Cooper Brothers * William Cooper (businessman) (1761–1840), Canadian businessman * William Cooper (co-operator) (1822–1868), English co-operator * Wil ...

(1754–1809), the founder of

Cooperstown, New York Cooperstown is a village in and the county seat of Otsego County, New York, United States. Most of the village lies within the town of Otsego, but some of the eastern part is in the town of Middlefield. Located at the foot of Otsego Lake in ...

. He was also distantly related to

Nebraska Nebraska ( ) is a landlocked U.S. state, state in the Midwestern United States, Midwestern region of the United States. It borders South Dakota to the north; Iowa to the east and Missouri to the southeast, both across the Missouri River; Ka ...

State Representative Paul F. Clark. Cooper grew up in Cooperstown. He was educated at the private

Taft School The Taft School is a private coeducational school located in Watertown, Connecticut, United States. It enrolls approximately 600 students in grades 9–12. Overview History The school was founded in 1890 as Mr. Taft's School (renamed t ...

, at

Yale College Yale College is the undergraduate college of Yale University. Founded in 1701, it is the original school of the university. Although other Yale schools were founded as early as 1810, all of Yale was officially known as Yale College until 1887, ...

, and at

Trinity College, Cambridge Trinity College is a Colleges of the University of Cambridge, constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Founded in 1546 by King Henry VIII, Trinity is one of the largest Cambridge colleges, with the largest financial endowment of any ...

. At Yale he was an editor of campus humor magazine ''

The Yale Record ''The Yale Record'' is the campus humor magazine of Yale University. Founded in 1872, it is the oldest humor magazine in the United States."History", The Yale Record, March 10, 2010. http://www.yalerecord.com/about/history/ ''The Record'' is c ...

''.''Yale Banner and Pot Pourri''. New Haven: Yale University Press. 1926. p. 238. He married Marion Erskine. Their son Paul Fenimore (P. F. Cooper, Jr.) became a physicist and Arctic explorer; he was elected a Fellow of the Arctic Society in 1954. He died in 1970. Some of Cooper's published books were ''Tricks of Women and Other Albanian Tales'' (1928), a translation of folk tales; '' Tal: His Marvelous Adventures with Noom-Zor-Noom'' (1929), a children's book about an orphan and the fantastical adventures he encounters on a quest to the land of Troom; ''Island of the Lost'' (1961), a non-fiction account of the Arctic expedition of

Sir John Franklin Sir John Franklin (16 April 1786 – 11 June 1847) was a British Royal Navy officer, explorer and colonial administrator. After serving in the Napoleonic Wars and the War of 1812, he led two expeditions into the Canadian Arctic and thro ...

, told within a "biography" of

King William Island King William Island (, ; previously: King William Land) is an island in the Kitikmeot Region of Nunavut, which is part of the Arctic Archipelago. In area it is between and making it the list of islands by area, 61st-largest island in the world ...

and the resident

Eskimo ''Eskimo'' () is a controversial Endonym and exonym, exonym that refers to two closely related Indigenous peoples: Inuit (including the Alaska Native Iñupiat, the Canadian Inuit, and the Greenlandic Inuit) and the Yupik peoples, Yupik (or Sibe ...

; and ''Dindle'' (1964), a children's book about a dwarf who saves a kingdom from a dragon. ''Tal'' has had enduring popularity; it was reprinted in new editions in 1957 and 2001.

References

Other sources:
Paul Fenimore Cooper
at Purple House Press
Obituary
(1970) reprinted at

JSTOR JSTOR ( ; short for ''Journal Storage'') is a digital library of academic journals, books, and primary sources founded in 1994. Originally containing digitized back issues of academic journals, it now encompasses books and other primary source ...

The Cooper Genealogy
(1983) at The James Fenimore Cooper Society (oneonta.edu/cooper)

at GenForum (genealogy.com)

External links

*
P. F. Cooper, Jr.
at LC Authorities, with 2 records, an
at WorldCat
(combined with a later wetlands and groundwater specialist, probably) {{DEFAULTSORT:Cooper, Paul Fenimore 1899 births 1970 deaths American children's writers Writers from Albany, New York People from Cooperstown, New York Taft School alumni Yale College alumni Alumni of Trinity College, Cambridge American expatriates in the United Kingdom