Jeff Cooper, the "Gunners' Guru", Passes

[Jeff Higgins]

The shooting world, hell the whole world for that matter, lost a great man the other day. Colonel Jeff Cooper has passed away. The father of the modern technique of the pistol, a champion of freedom, personal responsibility, and accountability, Colonel Cooper had a way of cutting through the b.s. and getting to the heart of just about any matter put before him. He will be sorely missed in a world that seems to get crazier and crazier by the day. Some of my favorite quotes, from The Art of the Rifle:

"Personal weapons are what raised mankind out of the mud, and the rifle is the queen of personal weapons."

"The rifle is a weapon. Let there be no mistake about that. It is a tool of power, and thus dependent completely upon the moral stature of its user. It is equally useful in securing meat for the table, destroying group enemies on the battlefield, and resisting tyranny. In fact, it is the only means of resisting tyranny, since a citizenry armed with rifles simply cannot be tyrannized."

"The rifle itself has no moral stature, since it has no will of its own. Naturally, it may be used by evil men for evil purposes, but there are more good men than evil, and while the latter cannot be persuaded to the path of righteousness by propaganda, they can certainly be corrected by good men with rifles."

[dhoward]

Met him about 18 years ago. Fascinating man.

[Milu]

Rest easy warrior.

[Joeaksa]

Met him years ago at a SHOT show. Man among men with a .45 cal 1911...

May he RIP!

[jriera]

Meet him many times over the years, been at Gunsite several times, both as a student and as a instructor.

Need to find the pictures I have with him and feel very sad.

You will be missed. RIP Jeff

[Jeff Higgins]

I never had the priveledge of meeting the man; my loss I'm sure. I had always meant to get down to Gunsite "someday" and always put it off. He did, however, provide me with countless hours of reading enjoyment through his books and magazine articles. The man had more than an average measure of just plain old common sense, and a clarity of thought, that shone through in his writings. I'm sure he was even more well-spoken in person. The world needs men like Jeff Cooper but, unfortunately, they seem to be making fewer and fewer of them. His kind of man has grown out of fashion today; looked at as a relic from a bygone era. I, for one, think we need to get back closer to that definition of a man. Maybe I'm a relic, too.

[nostatic]

I never read his stuff, but knew of him from reading posts about him on sigforum. Sounds like quite an individual. We need more individuals...

[Milu]

This site has a lot of his articles:

http://www.dvc.org.uk/jeff/

[daepp]

Jeff Cooper R. I. P. was infantry [ergo rifle].

The Infantry is Queen of Battle.

The Artillery is King of Battle.

It is a marriage consummated in war.

They are inseparable. They are unbeatable.

But it helps if you have armor [tanks] and close air support [attack aircraft].

My first choice of personal weapons is the Browning .50 caliber with my second choice being the Colt .45 M1911A1

One shot – one kill.

[Milu]

Originally posted by daepp
Jeff Cooper R. I. P. was infantry [ergo rifle].

I thought Jeff Cooper was a marine.