Born One Generation Past Slavery
And lived to vote for Barack Obama and see him elected president of the United States.
Fewer than 12 hours earlier, President-elect Barack Obama told the world the story of a 106-year-old woman who knew Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. as a child and who decades later cast her ballot for the country’s first African-American president. Obama spoke about Cooper at length in his nationally televised acceptance speech.
“She was born just a generation past slavery; a time when there were no cars on the road or planes in the sky, when someone like her couldn’t vote for two reasons — because she was a woman and because of the color of her skin,” he told thousands of supporters gathered in Chicago’s Grant Park.
“And tonight, I think about all that she’s seen throughout her century in America — the heartache and the hope; the struggle and the progress; the times we were told that we can’t, and the people who pressed on with that American creed: Yes, we can.”
Back in Atlanta Wednesday morning, throngs of reporters — NBC News, The London Times — traipsed through Cooper’s home near the Atlanta University Center, where she has lived since 1937.
Her reaction to Obama becoming the nation’s first black president: “I never thought we’d see that happen. I always thought it would be a white man. Now I see that things can change and I’m glad to know it.”
Tags: Kathy
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