Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1913-12-05

On the strength OF that Cooper moFea
from his country home in Westchester
County to New York and went at the
business of writing seriously, Up to
that time he had written only in a de-
sultory way.
1t is not necessary to give detailed
account of the writing of the books
that followed 1.-THE Spy; it is enough
to know that Cooper was happy, sue
cessfu and popular In England and
America he was hailed as '.the American
Scott He founded a club in New York
known as the Cooper Club. of which
| William Cullen Bryant and Morse, the
inventor of the telegraph, were men,
bers, and everywhere he was looked up
on as one of the men of whom the coun-
try could we'll be proud.
The beginning of his unpopularity came
| in 1926, when he changed his name from
James Cooper to James Fenimore Cooper
and put hyphen between the Fenimore
and the Cooper. He did this at the re-
| quest of his maternal grandmother, who
did not want the name of Feninore to
die out. and he very soon dropped the
hyphen, but there We're not lacking per-
sons to point out that this change in
name was sign of snobbishness and
was very "un-American." 1t was a lit
tie thing, but it marks the beginning of
Coopers unpopularity.
That same year he went to Europe.
and there he lived for seven wears
There seems to be no very good reason
why anybody who feels so inclined
should not live abroad seven wears.
Cooper was travelling and writing and
HnnIYlU ~ ntxrt
large number of provincial individ-
uais believed 1t exceedingly "un-Ameri-
can and said so loudly.
And it must be said that Cooper did
all he could to strengthen the impress
sion OF snohbishness when he returned
TO America. He found much to admire
In the older civilization of Europe. and
When he said so, and incidentally found
fault with some foibles of the America
OF his time, he started the avalanche of
DIS unpopularity. The articles and
travel stories which he wrote were un-
doubtedly not altogether tactful: on the
other hand there is no question but
that cooper's criticisms were made in
spirit of friendliness and with a desire
TO help correct the very faults he saw.
But a cheap and fiamboyant patriotism
cid not stop TO consider that Cooper
was snob and an aristocrat
In 1887 Cooper became involved in
wrangle with the people of his heme
town Of Cooperstown. n. Y, over the
ownership of point of land on Otsego
Lake which the tewnspeople had used
for many years as a picnic ground The
point belonged to the Cooper estate
and If n1t, l,n
Ct the Coopers that the people of the
town had been allowed to use it con-
tlnually.
A shelter house on the point had
been built by Coopers father for the
accommodation of the villagers, and
when, this building having become di-
lapidated, the townsmen sent work
men out to pull down the house and
chop down number of trees without
asking leave of the author, he was nat
rrally somewhat annoyed. He sent a
card" to the village newspaper, call
ing attention to the fact that the point
was his private property, and caution
ing the public against injuring the
trees. The card came too late for pub
/ lication. o.
/ Before the next edition of the paper
could come out exaggerated reports of
what the card really said were spread
/ about, and a number of defiant mes
| sageS, and even threats, were sent to
/ Cooper, intimating that evil things
would befall him if he interfered with
I the rights of the public on that point.
j Whareupon the novelist very natur-
/ ally grew angry and posted notice
/ against trespassing on the point.
/ Some of the citizens of Cooperstown
fancied that the point was really public
property, and a mass meeting was held.
at which resolutions were passed de-
nouncing the author, defying him and
announcing that the general public
would continue to use that point OF
course, it was easy enough for Cooper
to prove that the property was his,
/ and the whole affair simmered down
/ very soon But its effects were far
reaching.
Wing newspapers, already hostile to
the author for his criticisms of things
I American, took up the picnic GROUND
molehill and made a mountain out OF
it. Cooper was represented as an op-
pressor of the poor, wrestling from the
citizens the picnic ground that really
belonged to him. Incidentally he was
literally condemned, abused, malisned
and vilified.
And then Cooper's Irish was up
He brought libel suits against all the
newspapers that had libeled him, ana
he prosecuted these suits himself. he
was not lawyer. but he studied up on
the laws of libel, and so clear were MS
cases that he got verdicts against Hor-
ace Greeley, Thurlow Weed and otnef
New York editors without difficulty. lie
had vast number of suits, and spent
about six years prosecuting them. BY
1s45 he had cffectually silenced his ira
ducers
But the pugnacious author had lost
more than he had gained. He was very
generally disliked and there We're many
who hated him. He never regalneo inc
place he deserved in popular esteem,
ninth after his death, in 1851. Ihen-ano
not until he had been in his grave SIN
months-a public meeting was ne.u, d.
which DANIEL Webster and WiiiiaH
cullen Bryant spoke eulogies ana mace
son,e tardy amends to the memory Oh
*