Martha Cooper Dies at 66

Martha Hays Cooper died Thursday “after years of struggling with Alzheimer’s,” the office of her husband, U.S. Rep. Jim Cooper (D-Nashville), announced. She was 66.

The two married in 1985 while Jim was in his second term in Congress and Martha was a research assistant at the World Wildlife Fund.

She is survived by her husband, three children (Mary, Jamie and Hayes) and one grandchild, Jay.

A native of Mississippi, Martha attended Sweet Briar College and earned an M.S. in ornithology from Mississippi State University. Among other jobs, she worked on the National Geographic Field Guide to the Birds of North America. According to her obituary, her favorite bird was the Eurasian hoopoe.

“Martha was wary of politics until she lived in Shelbyville with Jim’s mother for a few months in 1984 to manage Jim’s first re-election campaign,” the obituary notes. “The experiment worked.”

Due to COVID-19, a family-only ceremony is planned.