Thomas Valentine Cooper Jr.

Thomas Valentine Cooper, Jr., 97, a resident of McLean, VA for the past 57 years, passed into eternal life on Monday, January 23, 2017 at Reston Hospital in Reston, Virginia. He was married to Nancy Lea Marshall, who predeceased him, for 52 years.

He was the son of Admiral Thomas V. Cooper and Bessie Kelso Baker Cooper (both deceased);and brother of twin sisters Suzanne and Sophia (deceased) He was the beloved father of Thomas Marshall Cooper, Nancy Lea Cooper McGreer; and Constance Valentine Cooper, who was his faithful caregiver for the past 2 ½ years; grandfather of Jennifer, Gregory (deceased), Robin, Julianna, Larissa, Conrad and Quentin; and, great-grandfather of Ashley, Christen, Boaz, Phoebe, Henrik and Marshall.

Growing up, he moved frequently to follow his father’s Naval career, attending 22 schools, including St. Albans School in Washington, D.C., and graduating from Episcopal Academy in suburban Philadelphia in 1939. He earned a BSME degree from the University of Virginia in 1948, after spending several years in the Army Air Corps during WWII working on Boeing B-29 Superfortress bomber mechanical systems in Tucson, Arizona.

After successfully battling polio as a youngster, he was quite athletic, and was best known for his 440 yd. races in the Penn Relays and for the University of Virginia. At age 16, he flew a biplane solo. Later in life he greatly enjoyed body-surfing in the NC Outer Banks, playing chess, and meeting with friends at McDonald’s, as well as eating at Red Lobster and Bob Evans.

His working career was always in sales, first in Philadelphia for Rohm & Haas, James G. Biddle, and Sperry Rand Univac, and then, following a year-long convalescence from tubercular pleurisy, he worked in Washington, D.C. for Control Data, and various IT services enterprises.

He became a Christian in the mid-1950’s, joining the healing-focused Order of St. Luke at the Gwynedd, Pa. Episcopal Church of the Messiah, and throughout the rest of his life followed the leading of the Holy Spirit by attending a number of evangelical Christian fellowships, including the Knights Of The Round Table. For many years he provided a healing ministry and offered a Christian perspective to the sick and infirm whom he visited in hospitals and nursing homes in Northern Virginia, Washington D.C. and Easton, Maryland. At age 90, he completed and published his Christian inspirational book A Logical Approach to Obtain Miracles.

Although his family and friends miss him greatly, we are comforted by the knowledge that he is now ‘absent from the body and present with the Lord” (2 Corinthians 5:8).

If you are inspired by his life and interested in making a contribution, he would have encouraged you to offer your time, talent and treasure to your local church’s healing and outreach ministries. Memorial donations may be made in his memory to In Touch Ministries, PO Box 7900, Atlanta, GA 30357; www.intouch.org.