Dr. Edward S. Cooper, M.D.
Medicine

In 1992, Dr. Cooper, became the first Black President of the American Heart Association (AHA). Early in his medical career, Dr. Cooper served as chief of medical services for the U.S. Air Force Hospital in the Philippine Islands. He also served as president and chief of medical services at the former Philadelphia General Hospital, and as co-director of the hospital's Stroke Research Center. Dr. Cooper eventually joined the medical staff of the University of Pennsylvania Medical School in 1958. In 1972, Dr. Cooper became the university's first Black tenured medical professor. He has been an active member in many professional organizations and was founding member and chaired the executive committee of the American Health Education for African Development and the American Foundation of Negro Affairs. A native of Columbia, S.C., Dr. Cooper comes from a family of medical specialists. "In the South, there were usually teacher families, minister families, or in our case, doctor families," he says. Cooper's father, the late H.H. Cooper St., was a dentist, so are his two brothers. His late wife, Jean Wilder Cooper, was a retired physician for the School District of Philadelphia, and their children have followed the family tradition. The Coopers' oldest daughter, Lisa, is a pediatrician; daughter Jan is an endocrinologist, and their son, Charles, is a clinical psychologist.