Paul Cooper 5/28/1951 – 3/3/2021

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Paul Cooper 2020

Paul Cooper 5/28/1951 – 3/3/2021

On March 3^rd, Paul Cooper, long-time resident of Berkeley, died of Covid. Born May 28^th, 1951, in Philadelphia, he came to Oakland in 1974 with his high-school sweetheart, Chris Orr, partners since they had attended the Woodstock music festival together in 1969.
 
Very soon after his arrival to San Francisco Bay, he began work at the American Baptist Seminary of the West (now the Berkeley School of Theology) becoming Superintendent of Buildings & Grounds.
 
Concerned for the Earth, a tinkerer and inventor, he and his friend Keith Rutledge started the Alternative Energy Collective which, on the first national Sun Day celebration May 1978 in People’s Park, set up an exhibit of various handmade solar devices constructed in the basement of the seminary. The group became a non-profit scientific and educational organization and created the “Steps to Energy Self-Reliance” exhibit for the New Earth Expo festival in San Francisco. It was at that event that a representative of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area asked if the AEC would be interested in setting up an alternative energy center at Fort Cronkhite in the Marin Headlands. Deciding to devote full time to the AEC he left the seminary in 1981, the position to be eventually filled by his brother Gary.
 
After a couple of years at Fort Cronkite, the U.S Department of Energy displaced the AEC’s down-home hands-on approach with large color posters and nicely furnished administrative offices. Needing a new home for the AEC, the collective with a few supporters bought an abandoned Exxon gas station in Oakland at Adeline and 59^th. The AEC added to its nonprofit educational, advocacy, and research, the Solar Station contracting division that among other projects, developed the solar water-heating systems for UC Cooperative Student Housing and the largest commercial solar water heating system in California for ABC Diaper Co. in Berkeley. 
 
Under the Jimmy Carter administration the development of alternative, renewal energy, especially solar, was encouraged and impetus was given the industry with incentives, principally in the form of tax credits. Solar panels were installed on the White House and the infant industry was off to a good start. Here, the Solar Station was known for having broken ground. 
 
Come Ronald Reagan, and the tax credits disappeared as did the solar panels from the White House. Solar’s growth was abruptly crippled, and the Solar Station (like many others of its kind) went under; the Solar Station was forced to declare bankruptcy and with it the AEC ceased to exist.
 
Paul Cooper then started a successful plumbing business from the basement of our house, and in 1997 partnered with Heiko Dzierson to form Pipe Spy Sewer Service whose ubiquitous trucks are now a common sight in the S.F. Bay Area. 
 
Paul never stopped being concerned for the Earth, and tinkerer and inventor that he was, took delight in driving his electric-power converted old Porsche in the annual Alameda Fourth of July parade. In his spare time, he and Justin Gray formed Cooper-Gray Robotics focused on big projects like innovative remote-controlled construction vehicles (skid-steers, excavators, and such) with electric drives. The company closed in 2020 as Paul prepared for retirement.
 
In the forty-six years of our friendship, Paul and I played, supported each other, collaborated, partnered in many things, not only in the AEC and Solar Station days, but in the house we shared on Woolsey St., with keys to each other’s homes, a wall between us through which I could hear his guitar strumming, his and his wife Chris’ laughter, and they perhaps could hear my snores. He was always ready to help with setting up my art installations at the Mexican Museum of San Francisco, the Oakland Museum of California; restoring the balcony; remodeling of the kitchen. He was generous in sharing the blooms of his carefully cultivated cannabis. And generous with his gab; if you asked him for the time of day, he was likely to tell you the history of the clock.
 
Generosity and largeness of spirit was Paul, loving and kind. At a recent remembrance of Paul at the headquarters of Pipe Spy, the workers, some with the company from its beginning (apprentices, journeymen, masters of the craft) after silently meditating and remembering him were asked to answer on a large sheet of paper the question: What gift did Paul bring to your life? A few of the answers: ¡Qué regalo trajo Paul! Best example for all of us. Agradecido. Always happy. Presencia. Safety! Paciencia, Gran Amistad. Friendship. Buen maestro. Good guy. Comunicativo. Honestidad. Compasión. ¡Luz!
 
Yes, Light. So many things could be said of Paul, so many virtues named, but light says it all. The pandemic has its heroes, its fallen, and they are not always healers working in the hospitals. Some of our essential workers are modest in accolades, like the plumber who keeps our water, that essence of life, running to quench our thirst and rid us of our waste. And great men (and women) like Paul Cooper fill such roles. A deep, deep hole his absence leaves to be filled only with the light he brought into so many lives.
 

Rafael Jesús González

Paul Cooper 1969

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