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Published: January 26th 2010
Miller's Drugs
Inside the Miller's Drugs. Soda fountain is on your left.We spent a couple of hours in Cooper, Texas last Saturday. We were on our way to another destination when the rains started falling so we side tracked and stopped at Cooper, Texas A town of about 2000 located some 15 miles from Commerce, the closest largest town. Cooper is certainly not a "destination town" and except for a couple of large lakes close to town nothing much seems to take place there. The town is certainly having it's economic struggles as the streets are in deplorable condition with pot holes, payment crumbling and unfortunately a lot of water the day we were there.
The countryside around time is nice and we understand that agriculture used to be the prime industry. The town claims to be the Capitol of the World for VETCHES. We had no idea what this was so we browsed the internet and found VETCHES to be flowering plants. Capitol of the World, that might be stretching it a little. This was no doubt a proud little community many years ago as they have a town square with a gazebo in the middle. Brick streets are abundant in the immediate downtown area. One of the most interesting
Miller's Drugs
These are the counters and merchandise that we found a couple of years ago. They are now gone. places is the old Miller's Drug Store that has been around since the 1930s. A couple of years ago we visited that drug store when we read about it in a magazine. There is a working soda fountain in the store and at that time many of the counters remained in the store with most of them filled with old merchandise. I have inserted some pictures of what we found. Unfortunately some of the counters have been sold along with the merchandise. We talked with the women who runs the soda fountain. She has been there since the 1950s, knows all about the town and it's people. Notice that the Republican Headquarters is located just across the street. There were hundreds of election signs all over town. If you travel trough Cooper be sure and stop at the old Miller's Drug Store. A private collection of cameras, film and other photographs items was still int eh store this past week end.
There are some small restaurants on the square, including a pizza store and a Mexican food restaurant. The court house is located about a block from downtown and there is a hamburger place across the street. A Dairy
Miller's Drugs
The Wurlitzer jute box is in the corner at Miller's Drugs. Queen sits at the city limits.
Several churches are located in Cooper. The downtown square has a few operating business however for the most part buildings are deteriorating and some are already closed and boarded up. As I wrote streets are in extremely poor condition. There is a city park at the edge of town and we were told some activity is held there each year. The tennis courts are in bad shape and appear not to be in used.
A new grade school in under construction at the edge of town and just a few feet from the Junior/Senior High School building. The grade school is being built on a lot that the day we were there was full of water.Data on the internet shows the medium income for Cooper to be $27784 per family while the state's average in more than 50% higher that this.One site shows medium home prices in Cooper to be $71000 while the state's figure is $126,300.
Like I said this is not a destination town, however the old drug store is worth a visit if you get there before it's all gone.
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Robbie Craig
non-member comment
Enjoyed your blog, interesting and true. When I moved to the Cooper area about 43 years ago it was a nice little town, a few small stores(all gone now), the square has changed much since then, buildings are still there, they seem to be trying to repair and dress it up a bit now. It's still a nice little farming town and we like it. Thanks for your blog