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John and LaVonne (Bonnie) Cooper will be attending Charleroi High School's 60th anniversary reunion on August 13 and 17 days later they'll celebrate their 58th wedding anniversary. For John, this will be the first class reunion where he says "now I feel I belong." The reason for that is he just received his high school diploma. He and his high school sweetheart, Bonnie Moss, parted after 11th grade, when John entered military service during World War II. She graduated with the Class of 1944 and he with the Class of 2004. "The students gave me a standing ovation when I was presented my diploma," John said. John explains the circumstances: "In June of 2003 Act 73 was passed, which authorized school districts to grant high school diplomas to any honorably discharged veteran who served in the United States military in World War II, between Sept. 16, 1940 and Dec. 31, 1946. "To be eligible, an individual must have been a member of a high school class that graduated during the years 1941 and 1950, but did not receive a high school diploma due to entering military service." For his first four years of formal education, John attended Cooper School in Fallowfield Twp. His grandmother, Hannah Cooper, had donated property with the stipulation it be used for a school building. "It was a two-room school without indoor plumbing," he recalled. During his junior year at Charleroi High, he had classes from 9 a.m. to 3 p.m. and then went to work at Corning Glass from 10 p.m. to 6 a.m. "Bonnie often had to nudge me when I dozed off during class," he smiled. When his classmates graduated on June 3, 1944, John was on his way to Normandy as a Navy gunner. "After Normandy was secured, I made runs from Liverpool, Cardiff, Belfast and Northern Ireland to the established beachheads, he said. His military career also took him to the Philippines and Okinawa, the latter as a point from where they prepared for the invasion of Japan. "After surviving two typhoons and the atomic bombing, I was sent back stateside to California for a day leave," Cooper said. "My records were lost in the typhoons and, after the leave, they assigned me to a mine sweeper going to the South China Sea. "The day before we were to sail, I was pulled out and shipped to Shoemaker, Calif., and discharged," he continued. He resumed work at Corning and married his high school sweetheart on Aug. 30, 1946, in St. Jerome Catholic Church, Charleroi. They have two sons, John Scott Cooper, of North Charleroi, and William Clinton Cooper, of Fallowfield Twp. The boys were named after Cooper and Moss family members. There are four grandsons, one granddaughter and one great-grandson. "I am proud to have served my country and proud of my wife and family," John said, summing up his life. Incidentally, somewhere between the class reunion and the wedding anniversary, John Cooper will celebrate his 79th birthday. | Melvin Bassi, '44 | Hubert Braunegg, '42 | Bonnie Moss, '44 & John Cooper, '04 | Eleanor Pyzynski, '44 | Stewart 'Budd' Cole & Ed Palumbo, '38 | William 'Bill' Suzich, '48 | Floyd Holroyd, '44 | | TEACHERS/STAFF | THE 40's and PRIOR | THE 50's | THE 60's | THE 70's | THE 80's | THE 90's | THE NEW MILLENNIUM! | | Return Home | 'Contact Us'... Submit Profile & UPDATES | Class Directory | Reunions (Includes Possible ALL 60's Reunion) | Where Are They Now? / Where They Were | Photo Gallery | TOWN TALK | Sports! | SCHOLASTICS | |
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