Doug Cosper, a lifelong journalist and educator who combined a ferocious devotion to watchdogging the powerful, rigid accuracy, and rich storytelling with a warm, self-deprecating style that charmed friends and hostiles alike, died of cancer July 21 at his self-built Nederland area home, completing an adventurous and accomplished life of 75 years.
Doug was a well-known and beloved presence in the Nederland and Boulder communities, with a network of close friends, colleagues and former students that spanned the Front Range — and the globe. He also raised two daughters, Pippa and Anna Cosper, of whom he was very proud, and served as grandfather to as many as six children who thought the world of him.
He traveled the world early and late in his long reporting and teaching career, spending more than a decade in the early 2000s training aspiring journalists in 11 countries, many of which were led by governments resistant, at best, to the ideals of the free press.
In doing so, he touched a generation of young journalists across the world, guiding them in what — to them — were often startling concepts, such as writing a fair and balanced story, asking questions about the use of public money, the role good journalism plays in building community, and trying to coax information from officials reluctant to provide it. Ideas well understood by American journalists were difficult to process for aspiring reporters living for years under oppressed conditions. But, under Doug’s tutelage, the eager students blossomed.
“He was a master at coaching, exciting and inspiring students, many of whom knew little about how a democracy and a free press worked,” said Barrie Hartman, a close friend and former Daily Camera editor who hired Cosper for a reporting job in 1992, days after meeting him on a Boulder street corner. Hartman noted that in some of the third world countries where Cosper taught he faced the threat of deportation and jail for his work.
Born in St. Louis on December 6, 1949, to Roy Cosper and Ruth Eugas, Doug would move as a child with his family to Tyler, Texas.
He proceeded to cram three lifetimes into one. After graduating from Southern Methodist University in the early 1970s, he co-founded a successful waterbed business, turning a $6,000 loan into a business that generated $1 million a year in annual sales. Within five years, he’d sell his shares and travel the world via the hippie trail.
Because Doug was Doug, he did his traveling on foot, visiting 17 countries, mostly as a pedestrian, in the Middle East and south Asia over two years, in what would prove to be a kind of preview of the places where he would teach more than two decades later.
Doug’s newspaper reporting career began in Tyler in 1983. His days at the Tyler Morning Telegraph and Tyler Courier Times, in east Texas, were a source of endless barstool stories over the years, as Cosper recalled the characters, the rough justice and corruption that was fodder for news coverage in his salad days. One of his favorites involved the acquittal by an all-white jury of a black man in the murder of a white man – a stunning outcome in that place and time – because many in the community said the unpopular victim had it coming.
Doug was a natural journalist, gifted, as Hartman said, “at putting people at ease and gaining their trust when going after a story.” He would join United Press International in the mid-1980s as a foreign correspondent in The Hague, where he quickly built the reputation as an agile newsman, often the first to get at “the news behind the news,” which made him a valued wire service player in the news-soaked theater of Europe. He broke stories involving the World Court, NATO and the European Economic Community (EEC), before it became part of the European Union.
Doug first came to Boulder in 1980, where he would earn a master’s degree in journalism at the University of Colorado. Following his work in Texas and overseas, he returned to the region on a teaching contract at CU, where he would instruct students on and off into the early 2000s. He was a popular lecturer, teaching news writing and reporting courses
“Doug was an ‘old-school’ journalist in the best sense of the words,” said Len Ackland, a former journalism professor at the late CU Boulder School of Journalism and Mass Communication. “When he was an instructor at the School he presented students with ‘Billy-Bob’ Texan scenarios to teach them how to write interesting, complete, informative stories. They loved it.”
In the 1990s, at the Daily Camera, Doug became the Camera’s higher education reporter, providing tough coverage of the university where he had taught. Hartman later called Doug “the best reporter of my career,” a high compliment considering Hartman worked in journalism for more than four decades. It was at the Camera where Doug met Carol Rowe, a fellow journalist. The two were married in 2013, with Hartman presiding over the ceremony.
Doug’s newspaper career also included joining the team that launched the weekly Boulder Planet in 1996 when major changes at the Daily Camera led him and many others to move on. The Boulder Planet, with Doug and several fellow former talented Camera reporters on its staff, became a steady thorn in the Camera’s side before ending publication in 2000.
In yet another corner of Doug’s crowded living room of a life, he took on development work, mostly in Nicaragua where in the late 1990s he worked to improve access to drinking water and on disaster relief issues following Hurricane Mitch.
His talents were sprawling. He developed expertise on energy efficient homebuilding, constructing his first home in Nederland in 1981, and his second home, a heavily windowed, south-facing passive solar home in the hills north of Nederland in 1989. It was the home he would remain in, between travels, for the rest of his life. He loved this home and the crusty, old mountain community to which he and Carol were integrally connected.
The final phase of Doug’s journalism career spanned 12 years, as through various teaching grant programs including Fulbright, State Department and USAID, he brought journalism education to third-world countries, those struggling with fledgling democracies, those still under military control, and those grappling with authoritarian or quasi-authoritarian government. He worked with programs training young journalists in Romania, Cambodia, Vietnam, Laos, Thailand, Azerbaijan, Maldives, Botswana, East Timor, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Myanmar and South Sudan.
Over the years, he wrote many letters home from his adventures. The letters serve as fascinating windows into places most Americans know little about and provide a journalist’s sharp-eyed view of daily life, with unsparing critiques of government, the various hazards of truth-telling along with humorous observations from the perspective of a curious American writer and reporter.
In a lasting gift to all, he later compiled all the letters on his website (dougcosper.com) where they serve as a fascinating snapshot of not only his teaching experiences but of countries and peoples struggling to find their way under often chaotic conditions and histories. They are an entertaining blend of reportage and humor. Samples:
· From Bucharest, Romania: “The madman dictator Ceausescu was executed after a 30-minute trial (most people wonder what took so long) on Christmas Eve 1989 after subjecting the country to some 25 years of his egomania.”
· From Phnom Penh, Cambodia: “The best thing about teaching in Cambodia is that you have to do it barefoot. And you can have fun with names. For example, every morning I get to say to a Vietnamese woman named Hanh (Hai), “Hi, Hi!”
· From Dili, East Timor: Doug wound up sharing beers one night with a fellow traveler in the world of international development, although this one his political opposite, a Republican who adored the first George Bush. “He told me he hadn’t talked to another American in a long time, and he obviously was hungry to share. I finally told him I was a Viet Nam draft resister and war protester, but by then we had had enough beers to let it go.”
· From Baku, Azerbaijan: The university had constructed a beautiful swimming pool. It was heavily guarded and off limits to students. At one point, Doug asked some students, “if they thought that might make a good news story, the pool being built with public money and all. They didn’t reply. I think they were thinking about why that would be news here. This is going to be interesting.”
Evidence of his impact came through between the lines of his letters. It’s clear he won students over with his knowledge, skills and supportive coaching, but also with his warm, “aw shucks” personality. He loved his students and his concern for them never slackened. Many of his students stayed in contact and he continued to mentor some of them in their lives and careers for decades after meeting them. He also served as a second father to one of his Burmese students, Htar Htar Myint, when she sought and won asylum in the United States.
In Doug’s later years, he and Carol learned Spanish and focused their travel around the Central and South American countries of Mexico, Nicaragua, Cuba and Peru. They also became devotees of a project in Nederland to restore and operate a historic carousel, the Carousel of Happiness, that opened in 2010 and developed into a big draw in the center of town, selling its millionth ticket in 2022. Doug and Carol together contributed many years to helping the non-profit succeed.
Doug also fulfilled a long-simmering dream, writing and publishing a middle grade novel, On Wings of Wonder, that was illustrated by his talented daughter Anna. The book tells a delightful story that weaves together his passion for the world’s struggling peoples, the Carousel of Happiness, and his belief that people must keep and protect their sense of wonder burning throughout their lives (onwingsofwonder.com). In honor of Doug, Carousel founder and close friend Scott Harrison carved a giant butterfly, “Flinder,” as homage to a magical creature in his book.
He was an amazing friend and somehow managed to maintain relationships with hundreds of people throughout his life. This was evident in his final weeks as many traveled and called to say their good-byes. He had a huge heart and always helped others when he could. He also loved hot dogs -- and oysters -- and his favorite restaurant was Freddie’s hot dog cart on the Pearl Street Mall, which was fully consistent with his simple desires.
In keeping with his no-fuss approach to life, Doug chose death with dignity and passed away in the arms of Carol on a Monday morning. A memorial service is being planned for fall in Nederland. Anyone interested in making a memorial contribution in his name can send a donation to his beloved Carousel (www.carouselofhappiness.org).
He is survived by his wife, Carol Rowe; daughter Pippa Cosper and husband Jesse Weber of Madison, Wisconsin; daughter Anna Cosper of Langley, Washington; and sister Dianne Zaharias and husband Dave Zaharias of Golden.
Doug’s final goal was to live long enough to walk Pippa down the aisle when she married Jesse on July 5. He cleared his goal by 16 days. He even danced with the bride, telling friends afterward, “I never had so much fun.”
Live long and prosper, Doug.
