Egbert Arthur Cooper 1874–1928

Result: NULL. No Egbert Arthur Cooper appears in the 1920 Texas index under the surname Cooper. The single Imogene Cooper in Texas in 1920 is a wife at Leonard, Fannin Co., b. abt 1902, in a household with Emma and Jack -- not ours, who was nineteen and a daughter at home, and who in any case could only be a Cooper WIFE by marrying a Cooper. The null is well bounded on the one axis that worried me: Egbert Arthur Cooper's birth year is itself disputed -- his death certificate [F.312] reads '187[3]', FamilySearch indexes 1873, the stone at [G.140] reads 1854 -- so an exact-year search is a weak instrument. But the 194 ranked rows span abt 1873 to abt 1880, so the 1873 reading is covered by the same list. Eastland County Coopers DO appear in it -- Ware Cooper of Eastland, Frank Cooper a lodger at Ranger, Lulu Cooper wife of Virgil V at Ranger, Fannie B Cooper -- which matters because Ranger is exactly where this family was: Imogene (Cooper) Shaw was born there in 1900 and Egbert Arthur Cooper died there in 1928. ⇒ The county is right and the household is not in it under this surname and this age. WHAT IS LEFT: the family is misindexed (a surname misreading, or 'E. A. Cooper' with an age the index put elsewhere), or they were outside Texas in January 1920. The next move is an ED-level browse of Ranger, Eastland Co., or a search on the mother Mary Leslie Maud (Newton) Cooper Mary Leslie Maud, whose given names are rarer than anyone else's in the household.

Result: THE NEWTON ANGLE IS A COMPLETE NATIONAL NULL, every row read in both renderings. She is not in the 1920 index as a Newton anywhere in the United States, and no Texas-born woman of her years appears under either spelling. ⇒ THE "SHE REVERTED TO HER MAIDEN NAME" READING IS DEAD, and with it the best lead this file had. THE FAMILY IS NOW MISSING FROM THE 1920 INDEX UNDER THREE SURNAMES: Cooper for him (national null, 183 rows, 2026-10-17), Cooper for her (Mau* Cooper, complete national null, 2026-10-16), and Newton for her (today). Both counties they are documented in are complete-list nulls, the parent-name fields are nulls, and his daughter Imogene is a page-1 read. THE CARL SEARCH IS NOT A NULL AND IS NOT WRITTEN AS ONE. 656 rows, page 1 of 14 read. The Texas-born Carl Coopers near the top are a household head at Polk Co. with a wife Lucy, a "Brother" at Chicago Ward 35, a patient at Boerne, a "G Carl" at Crockett Co., a boarder at Delta Co., and a son of J Charley and Eliza at Gray Co. - none identifiable as Carl Clay Cooper. Per this file's own 2026-10-16 note, Ancestry's ranking is NOT birthplace-ordered, so page 1 is not "the Texas cohort" and thirteen pages went unread. ⇒ THE INDEX IS EXHAUSTED FOR THIS HOUSEHOLD. What is left is not another search: it is an ED-by-ED IMAGE BROWSE of Ranger and the Eastland Co. districts, or a 1920-21 Ranger, Eastland or Cisco city directory to place them on a street first. Recorded plainly so that the next person does not spend another afternoon on index angles.

Result: NULL, NATIONALLY. No Egbert Cooper of any birth year appears anywhere in the 1920 index. The 183 rows are the surname plus every near-spelling the index folds in (Copper, Coopper, Cowper, Couper, Kuper, Hooper, Casper, Coppie…) against a given name fuzzed to the initial E, so the set is dominated by Mary E, William E, James E and the like. ⇒ His 1920 row, if it exists in the index, is under neither his given name nor an E initial. A METHOD NOTE, because this search's shape was misdescribed earlier today. birth=YYYY_place does NOT filter on the birthplace - these 183 rows are born in England, Russia, Canada, Germany and thirty US states. What bounds the set is the surname + given name + birth YEAR; the place half of the parameter only RANKS. That is still a genuinely bounded national search, and a useful one, but it should be described for what it is. The same applies to the parallel search on Charles Franklin Cooper run this morning - its conclusion is unaffected and is in fact broader than stated there, since the 156 rows are not restricted to Ohio-born men. UNCHANGED AND STILL THE BEST REMAINING LEAD: his wife Mary Leslie Maud (Newton) Cooper Mary Leslie Maud (NEWTON) Cooper - her maiden surname has never been searched - and an ED-by-ED browse of Eastland Co.

Result: NULL ON ALL THREE, but the first two are now COMPLETE-LIST nulls rather than claimed ones. (a) EASTLAND COUNTY RUNS TO ABOUT 128 ROWS ACROSS THREE PAGES - more than twice what page 1 showed - and page 3 leaves the county partway through (into Nueces, DeWitt, Jones, Lamar, Montague). The pages the earlier search never saw hold the Ranger households (J E/Nellie, Charles F/William R, Virgil V/Lulu, William/Isabell, Bessie, Christopher and a dozen roomers and lodgers), Justice Precincts 2, 4, 6, 7 and 8, and Cisco. NO EGBERT ANYWHERE IN THE COUNTY, and the near-spellings the index does hold separately - Josaphine and James COPPER at Eastland, Ora D and William P COUPER at Precinct 7, C E CAPPER at Cisco - are none of them him. One Ranger household is worth noting as checked and excluded: Virgil V Cooper, b. abt 1870 TEXAS, with wife LULU b. abt 1873 and seven children. Right county, right decade, close age - but our man's wife is Mary Leslie Maud Newton b. 1869 Mary Leslie Maud (Newton) Cooper and his children are Mary Augusta 1899 Mary Augusta Cooper, Imogene (Cooper) Shaw 1900 and John Henry Cooper 1901; Virgil's are Addie 1896, Virgil Jr 1898, Annie Louise 1900, Cecil 1902, Charley 1908, Elizabeth 1909 and Florine 1916. Not the same family. (b) HAMILTON COUNTY HOLDS ONLY SIX COOPER ROWS IN 1920 and the list ends on page 1: the John and Grace Cooper household at Hamilton town (with Graham, Beulah and Stella) and one 'Juttie Cooper, granddaughter, b. abt 1910' at HICO. ⇒ He had left Hico and he had not reached Eastland - or he was indexed under something unrecognisable in either. 'Juttie Cooper' at Hico is the only loose thread: Hico is where he and Mary Augusta Cooper were in 1910, and a Cooper grandchild is still there in 1920 in another household. Probably unrelated; noted so it is not re-noticed as new. (c) NO COOPER among the Texas households headed by a man named Egbert - the Hardins, Rhodens, Yarbroughs, Smiths, Russells, Harpoles, Howes, Thompsons, Hayneses, Byrams, Tansils, Egglestons, Nordins, Bentleys, Hursts, Woods, Tucketts and Bains on page 1. ⇒ If he was enumerated in Texas in 1920, his GIVEN name as well as his surname is unrecoverable from the index. WHAT IS LEFT is unchanged in kind but better bounded: an ED image browse of Ranger and the Eastland Co. districts, a 1920-21 Ranger or Eastland city directory, or a record placing the family somewhere in the decade. AND ONE ANGLE NOT YET TRIED, per the new finding-aid rule in the descendant-sweep skill: go at him through his CHILDREN - Mary Augusta Cooper Mary Augusta, Imogene (Cooper) Shaw and John Henry Cooper were 21, 20 and 19 in 1920 and may be indexed where he is not.

Result: NULL ON BOTH, BUT NEITHER IS A COMPLETE READ AND THAT IS STATED RATHER THAN GLOSSED. (a) The Texas-born Imogenes on page 1 are Pickard, Davis, Proctor, Carnbron, Alexander, Copland, Yates, Smith, Estes, Poff, Kelley, Murray and Henson - no Cooper among them, and the one Imogene Cooper in the set is a Kentucky-born daughter of Hiram and Ollie M at Mount Washington, Bullitt Co., Kentucky. THE LIMIT: the ranking is NOT birthplace-ordered - Texas-born rows appear at positions 1-14 AND again at 21-24 and later - so page 1 is NOT 'the Texas cohort' and 155 pages were not read. Per the page-count rule written into [[feedback_ancestry_place_recipe_when_names_are_garbled]] today, this is recorded as a page-1 read, not as a null for Texas. (b) THE FATHER FIELD FUZZY-MATCHES ON THE INITIAL. Asking for father = 'Egbert' returns fathers indexed 'George E', 'William E', 'J E', 'Charles E' and so on; the only true Egbert on page 1 is Egbert A. Martin of Waynoka, Woods Co., Oklahoma, whose daughter Immiogene was born about 1920 and is an infant. ⇒ The parent-name angle is weaker than it looked on Charles Franklin Cooper, where it was paired with a mother's name as well. Recorded so the next reader does not over-rate it. HIS WIFE WAS THEN TRIED, same day, same collection, and ONE OF THOSE IS A COMPLETE NULL: (c) Mau* Cooper (wildcard, to catch Maud / Maude / Maudie), birth 1869 +/-4, birthplace TEXAS, NO PLACE OF RESIDENCE AT ALL - i.e. the whole United States. ⇒ EXACTLY FOUR ROWS IN THE ENTIRE 1920 INDEX, AND NOT ONE OF THEM IS TEXAS-BORN: Maude Cooper (b. Iowa) at Medicine, Rooks Co., Kansas; Mandy Cooper (b. Louisiana) at New Orleans; Maude K Cooper (b. Indiana) at Lewis, New Madrid Co., Missouri; Maurice Cooper (b. Russia) at Seattle. THAT IS A COMPLETE NATIONAL NULL on one page, not a page-1 read: there is NO Maud-or-Maude Cooper born in Texas about 1865-1873 anywhere in the 1920 United States. (d) Mary Cooper, birth 1869 +/-2, birthplace Texas, no residence - 327 rows over 7 pages, PAGE 1 ONLY read (stated as such). The Texas-born women on it are Mary H Cooper (husband John W, Titus Co.), an unmarried Mary Cooper heading a household in Fort Bend Co., and Mariah A Cooper (husband Moses, Houston Co.) - none married to an Egbert. Pages 2-7 unread. STILL OPEN, and the family is now missing from the 1920 index under BOTH spouses' names. The untried members of the household are Carl Clay Cooper Carl C (22 in 1920), Mary Augusta Cooper Mary Augusta (21) and John Henry Cooper John (19) - though 'John Cooper' is not a searchable name - and Mary Leslie Maud (Newton) Cooper's MAIDEN surname NEWTON, which has never been searched in 1920 at all and is the obvious next move if she was widowed-in-all-but-name or the couple had separated.

Result: EXCLUDED, DECISIVELY. Ware Cooper, 47, b. abt 1873 Texas, RACE: BLACK, a COOK in a PRIVATE FAMILY - a servant in the household of SIMON P. SEASTRUNK at South Scaman, Eastland town, ED 97, page 4B, with Ellen Cooper, 23, also a cook. Ancestry offers 'Wall Cooper' and 'Will Cooper' as alternate readings of the given name; none of them is Egbert. ⇒ Our man is recorded WHITE on every census of his life, was a mechanic, and had a wife and children. The row that looked like it might be him because of an age and a county is a different man in a different life. THE LOOSE END IS CLOSED - it is no longer something a future reader has to wonder about, which is the whole point of having written it down. His 1920 remains unfound, and the next step is unchanged: an image browse of the Ranger / Eastland Co. enumeration districts, or 1920 Texas city directories.

Result: NULL on all four. (a) Ancestry reduces 'Egbert' to the initial E and returns E-initial Coopers; no Egbert exists in the index. (b) The Eastland Co. Coopers are the Griffin N, Albert, T L, John H, Obora, John H sr, George C, Brooks M and Orlando households plus a few lodgers - no Egbert, and no head born in Texas c.1874 with a wife Mary or Maud. ONE ROW NOT RULED OUT: 'Ware Cooper', Eastland town, b. abt 1873 Texas, with NO relationship and NO household members listed - the right age and the right county. The name is not a plausible mis-reading of Egbert and nothing else supports it, so it is recorded as a loose end, not a candidate. (c) The only Coopers indexed in Hamilton Co. in 1920 are John and Grace Cooper's household at Hamilton town and a granddaughter 'Juttie Cooper' at Hico - he had left. (d) No Imogene Cooper born in Texas c.1900 anywhere in the 1920 index. ⇒ Same pattern as the Kansas branch: the household is in the images but not retrievable from the index under these names. The next step is an image browse of the Ranger / Eastland Co. EDs, or the 1920 Texas city directories.

Result: NULL.

Result: FOUND: Fort Worth Star-Telegram 9 Oct 1928 p. 1 (site index: 8 Oct p. 19) 'Lifelong Texan Dies Listening Over Radio' [J.394], downloaded. Same wire item in the Abilene Daily Reporter 9 Oct p. 2 (not downloaded). Fort Worth Star-Telegram 10 Oct p. 4 and Record-Telegram 29-30 Oct items not opened.

Result: 'Texas, U.S., Death Certificates, 1903-1982': Egbert Arthur Cooper, b. 29 Apr 1873 Waco, d. 8 Oct 1928 Ranger (= [F.312]); the rest are other women and men d. 1928.

Result: FOUND the death certificate: 'Texas, Deaths, 1890-1977', ark 1:1:K37W-DNQ, image 2226 - downloaded as [F.312]. Index: parents J B Cooper and Hariett Starr. Tree profile KVJV-559 Egbert Arthur Cooper 1873-1928 (not opened further).

Result: Memorial 133916785 'E A Cooper', 29 Apr 1854 - 8 Oct 1928, Evergreen Cemetery, Ranger = [G.140]. Nothing new.