Hollywood Studio Magazine (May 1972)

All of his life, Gary sketched and painted. He had studied in college to become a commercial artist and had invaded Los Angeles in the Early Twenties to try to gain a job as a newspaper illustrator. Riding in Westerns to gain “earing money” turned him into an actor. When he died, three Oscars were in his trophy room. GARY COOPER impending death. When he himself passed suddenly a few years later, I wondered if he might not have had a peculiar psyche. On that April, 1961, afternoon, Wald was explaining that the Academy was giving Gary, an honorary award a few nights hence. Jerry was on the board of governors and had prompted the award without revealing the sad truth that it would be Coop’s last kudo. Wald told Perry and me the details of the terminal condition: how Mrs. Cooper had been told by the doctor just after the preceding Christmas and had kept it from Gary. Wald related that Mrs. Cooper had come upon Gary getting ready his hunting guns for a trip into the mountains after Grizzly Bears. She had known then that the star finally had to be told. She had telephoned the doctor. The story of that session with the physician was so typically Gary Cooper that I’ll always believe it. It was said that, after he had heard he was dying, Gary’s first concern was about the doctor. He had moaned, “It must be a horrible experience for you to tell a patient that he’s dying.” That was in February. Just as believable was the story of how Coop had called his close friend, Ernest Hemingway, himself- seriously ailing, to say, “Well, Pappa, I’m going to beat you to the corral.” The tall man who seemed eternal For the first decade at least of Gary Cooper’s career as a star at Paramount, his father. Judge Cooper, of Montana, was on the lot almost daily and was a beloved person to all who loved Gary. By Teet Carle f It seems incredible that Gary Cooper has been gone from the exuberant scene of life for eleven years this month. He died on May 14, 1961. Actually, on that April afternoon a month before his passing when producer Jerry Wald told me and Perry Liber in his office at 20th Century-Fox that “Coop” was dying of cancer, my reaction was “Of course Jerry’s wrong this time.” It just did not fit in with the scheme of the universe away back then for Gary not to be around whenever troubled folk needed to look to a stalwart, modest, strong, tender guy for comfort. Not that he was indestructible, but he sure represented the eternal man. After the first moment of disbelief that day, I chilled with the realization that it must be true. Wald had an uncanny way of knowing about I had seen the Cooper-Hemingway friendship begin. I sat at a luncheon table, to cover the event with copy and photographs strictly as a publicist, when Cecil B. DeMille got the star and novelist together in advance of making “For Whom the Bell Tolls.” At the time, De Mille was to produce and direct filmization of that best-seller. Gary had starred in “The Plainsman” and “Northwest Mounted Police” for C.B. and liked him. Gary became so chummy with Hemingway instantly that he agreed to appear as the hero of the novel. De Mille, however, was asked to make “Reap the Wild Wind,” instead rather than make a movie that already would be a blockbuster. Paramount thus got two smash hits instead of only one. The night of the awards, I was working backstage in the press rooms and I had anticipated seeing Gary and congratulating him without mentioning. I had not really seen him