Memories of Roger Cooper

So Roger has passed and I feel that one consolation is that age shall not weary him and the years condemn in the sense that I will remember him as an active person rather than as an old man who couldnt do the things he loved.
Having attended his funeral and the wake it struck me that there were many .'compartments' in Rog's contacts.
There were original Bristol friends like me, college friends such as Reyno and Alan, work colleagues like Nick, Emma and Michelle, Bristol Rovers fellow sufferers, 'walkers and talkers' led by Andy, family, of course, and no doubt contacts abroad who were streaming the funeral. There we all were in one form or another and at the end I felt we should all form a RAG group - a Rog Appreciation Group, with reuinions to remember him by.
The only problem is that it would need Rog himself to organise it ! Who else could manage to perform such a task?

SENDING LOVE TO FAMILY AND FRIENDS, WILL ALWAYS REMEMBER MY VERY SPECIAL FRIEND. XXX
LOVE FROM CAPE TOWN

I first met Roger in 1970 at Oxford Polytechnic, where we both embarked on a four year course in Town and Country Planning.
Roger, or Rogel, as he was sometimes known, kept us amused with his passion for all things Bristol and Somerset.
For us students this involved lots of drinking and singing in The Grapes in Oxford, where Roger led renditions of Twoce Daily , zOh Sir Jasper, and The Woodpecker.
At the end of each college year, a group of us would follow Roger into deepest Somerset to enjoy scrumpy and the music of Adge Cutler and the Wurzels.
These are my fond memories of Roger.
For me, Roger was always up for laugh, a song and a pint.
His passing is a shock and a reminder of our own mortality.
"Drink up thy cider for tonight we'll merry be"

I first came across Roger on CTRL - this was the project to be on - and we were charged with planning it, looking at options and producing the environmental impact assessment. Roger lead this and thank god because, for most of us, the job was the first big thing we’d done after college. It was great fun and he encouraged us to do our best - which we did even in the face of the unforgiving folks in Kent and East London. He gave the team a voice in a sceptical project not used to dealing with the environment stuff. As a consequence we prevailed and that railway works for many people in Kent, London and the Continent today and for the foreseeable future. A wonderful legacy.

Roger and I went on to Railtrack where we re-motivated the Thameslink Project. We parted when a job came up for me on the West Coast Route Modernisation Project - we kept in touch as part of the Railtrack Environment Group and helped reshape how rail business could work better for the environment.

We met again at Temple in the early stages of HS2 where he brought his expertise to help shape a new railway between London and Birmingham. Having had a second taste of Parliamentary work - what fun!! - Roger saw sense and retired to travel the world to realise his sporting interests.

We lost touch but I was pleased to catch up with him on a call just a couple of months ago.

Roger helped, mentored and coached a lot of people - me included - and I’m grateful for his help which has shaped my career. I’m also grateful for his sense of humour and his knack of keeping everyone going even when the going was tough.

Thank you Roger, you’ll be sorely missed.

I can’t remember when I first met Roger but as he was part of the Mike Procter Foundation we quickly became friends. My late husband was Eddie Barlow the South African Springbok cricketer (as they were called then) and played with Mike so we always had a lot to talk about. In trying to convert me to football, he took me into his box at the Mem but to no avail. I nearly always sat with him at Walkers and Talkers at GCCC and found it very hard when I went after he had died. He was a truly lovely man and he will be much missed by all who knew him.💕🙏🏻

Roger and I had been friends since he conned his way into a job with Abbey National. So we went back a long way. Over 55 years possibly 57
He turned up for his interview at Bristol Baldwin Street branch with long hair Ahhhhhhh!!

He told the Manager that he was in a school play and needed his hair long for his part
He was a very popular part of the staff and before going to College he went on a trip to Sweden. The home of free love. Oh we were envious

He sent us a letter from Sweden with the envelope covered in pictures of
naked women, all carefully placed so as not to offend
Needless to say it had been opened by the Authorities
There was nothing salacious inside just a letter telling us how he was getting on

Roger went off to College in Oxford and Valerie (my first wife ) and I would drive him up to Oxford with our baby Andrew.

After his studies he moved to Newcastle where he met Irene. Roger’s wanderlust was too great to resist and he decided he was going to Australia. But he got sidetracked in Hong Kong and stayed with Housing Dept. for a number of years

On occasions he and Irene would stay with us in Sidcup before flying back to HK. He told Valerie that he was not going to stay in HK forever and we needed to come out and stay with him
Pandora’s Box was beginning to open.

Many times I would visit his Mother in Coventry and was kept up to date with Roger’s life abroad

He moved back to England and ended up in Reigate which was not that far from Sidcup.

Before our Silver Wedding we wanted to celebrate somewhere different. Roger set up a slide show featuring many of the places he had visited.

The upshot of that was a memorable holiday on Bali and Lombok

He set me on the path to international travel and there are many tales to tell .

He supported me when Valerie died, he asked me what I was going to do. I told him I planned to drive down through France and Spain to Portugal. He said that also appealed to him and could he join me. Thus was born the Thelma and Louise tale.

He was with me when we scattered some of Valeries’ ashes in a field near Keynsham

He mentored our children when they needed his guidance

He welcomed my new wife, Pat into his life, for which I commend him

I have so many happy memories of our times together

Rest in peace my friend we’ve covered a lot of ground and your memory lives on in the Cullen Family

Nick Cullen

Having read the truly moving memorials, I really would have liked to have known Roger better.

Roger was one of the "London Gas", the London based Gasheads and was truly a pleasure to talk to, One of those people that left a great impression on you, even if you only spoke for 5 minutes every few months.

I remember after one of our pub based meetings (pre-social media days) in London he asked if I was going to the home game the following Saturday. I said I was., but just with my two boys and my (now) Spanish ex-wife wouldn't be interested. In a flash he said "Come to the Presidents club as my guest and bring your boys and wife". Suffice to say, a great time was had by all of us, thanks to Roger". that's "just" the sort of things he did !

I'm now based in Spain, so a big thanks to the family in providing an online link to watch the ceremony. I know that i'll be shedding a tear and raising a glass to someone who made the world a better place.

Roger was a wonderful man. Fun, engaging, interesting, interested, kind, solid and reliable, no-nonsense, enthusiastic, cricket and football-loving (specifically Somerset, England and Bristol Rovers of course), energetic and intelligent.

Roger and I became friends through my late father, Nick Stadlen. After retiring as a High Court judge, my dad won the Cape Town International Film Prize for his documentary about the Rivonia Trial - Life Is Wonderful: Mandela's Unsung Heroes (available on Amazon). Through Roger, Dad interviewed Mike Procter and Lord Peter Hain on stage at South Africa House - brilliantly bringing together the world class cricketer whose career was cut short by anti-Apartheid sanctions and one of the men principally responsible for his career being cut short. When Dad, who died from mesothelioma (asbestos) in October 2023, was too ill to host a repeat event with Mike and Peter, I stepped in and got to know Roger in the process.

After Dad died, I inherited his friendship with Roger. We met twice at Clifton Nurseries for brunch or lunch in Maida Vale, and twice at Lord's. Most recently before play at the World Test Final at Lord's - fittingly involving South Africa. We had plans to watch a Somerset game together in Taunton at some point and Roger was lining up Andy Brassington for my 20 Questions With podcast.

I was looking forward to years of friendship with Roger, who improved the quality of my life with our shared passion for cricket and our easy chemistry. I really liked him. We just got on well and I was so lucky to have met him and become friends. I enjoyed his straightforwardness and admired his enjoyment of life.

Roger shared my disappointment that my Dad had died too soon - and now Roger himself has done the same. I'm gutted. And I'm deeply sorry for his family and friends. But he will, obviously, live on in all of us. Death cannot extinguish a force of life like Roger. 

I clearly remember the first time I met Roger. It was in the late 1980s. I was at a bus stop, standing next to a cool looking guy, waiting for the bus to take us through the Hong Kong Harbour Tunnel. By the time we'd travelled to the other side of the harbour he'd enticed me to move from my increasingly dire job and join the dynamic Hong Kong Housing Authority.. This organisation ran one of the largest public housing programmes in the world and was one in which Roger was to play, over the years, an increasingly important management role. So I'm very grateful to Roger. A great job and a new friendship built to last.
Since returning to England, a few of us, from these 'old days', have been staying in touch and meeting up for days out at various iconic sites. But the fun part was the chat. Mention has already been made elsewhere about Roger's interesting stories and his sense of humour and he was certainly true to form. He was always keen on anything to do with transport or history and had suggested a 'meet-up' in September at either the SS Great Eastern or the Aerospace Museum in Bristol. So we'll take that suggestion and visit both - and we'll really wish Roger was there.

I first met Roger in the late 1970s when we both worked in the Planning Department at Tyne and Wear Met County Council. At that time we weren’t close but got to know each other a little when we played on the departmental football team. I remember Roger as a very good footballer.
Fortuitously I next bumped into him in the early 1980s when I moved to Hong Kong. Eventually I joined him in working at the Housing Authority, where Roger was very well respected and well liked as leader of the Planning Team.
We both returned to live in the UK in the late 1980s and since then we would meet up every so often. Initially those meetings were as families with young kids but latterly were as retirees trying to,put the world to rights! It was always interesting to hear Roger’s tales of his latest travels round the world, whether they involved cricket or a visit to another exotic country.
I was also privileged to join Roger in his box at the Memorial Stadium on a number of occasions. I was welcomed by Roger and his Gashead mates, even though I was always supporting the opposition. The first time I went I was amazed to find out that as we walked through the ground Roger seemed to on first name terms with every person that we passed but I guess that was just Roger!
I am proud to have called you a friend. We will all miss you Roger.

I worked with Roger in Hong Kong for five years and we remained friends when we returned to the UK. I travelled overseas with him to many places, including South Africa. Although Cape Town’s Newlands Cricket Ground was not open to the public during our stay, Roger managed to blag our way past the security guards and into the venue for a look-see. In Cyprus we walked the ‘green line’ in Nicosia (and a bit beyond it), with Roger succeeding in establishing a verbal dialogue with some of the fully armed Greek Cypriot and Turkish forces who patrol just outside the UN buffer zone.

Roger was an adventurer who never stopped travelling. If he didn’t have a ‘frequent traveller’ 54-page passport then he certainly needed one. He was a great guy: a team player; full of stories (some of them were actually true); always a smile; a strong sense of humour; an environmental planner who saw the irony of his own travelling carbon footprint! Goodbye Roger; you will not be forgotten.

Andy Arrick

Roger always credited me with awakening his life-long passion for Russian history. He traced me again after a break of over half a century while he was writing his unfinished historical novel with an Imperial Russia background. We exchanged ever more elaborate e-mail letters, eventually met up again and exchanged overnight visits on a couple of occasions. Our age difference didn't matter as we reflected on the state of the world and became firm friends. He was warm, solid, reliable and always sage in his opinions, except on Brexit, over which we disagreed !
At the risk of my 'rambling on', as was his wont as well, he told a story of how he used to do all he could to avoid having to play rugby at St. Brendan's. One games afternoon, he slunk off with some like-minded mates to play soccer on a secluded pitch in the school grounds. They were spotted by that legendary and terrible school and Bristol rugby coach, Elwyn Price, whose tongue lashing in a Welsh accent, was as painful as any strap could inflict !
He was a good man, a 'Free Spirit'. I miss him badly.

I first knew Roger in his Tyneside years in the seventies. I shared his love of Bristol as I had been a student there in the late sixties. I lived in Eastville in the days before the Motorway not far from Eastville Stadium when Bristol Rovers played in the middle of a Greyhound Stadium with rose bushes behind the goals. Later he invited me to stay in Hong Kong for a month. He was a courteous and generous host with a great enthusiasm for the work he was doing for the Housing Department . He took me all over non tourist Hong Kong. He was a keen sportsman and my favourite memory of him was watching him play for his football team in Happy Valley Stadium. A touch of Rovers in the Orient! Latterly our paths crossed when I was with Lichfields and he was involved in the Railways. We shared convivial lunches in London . He was always pn fine form and still with a great passion for the work he was doing.

I met Roger and his friend in Santiago, Chile when we were all staying at the same hotel. We were all searching for the bar for a drink,😂😂😂, struck up a conversation and had a couple of drinks together. I had just finished hiking Torres del Paine in Patagonia and Roger was heading off for a cruise the next day with his friend. Roger and I got together for dinner that night and became WhatsApp friends until his passing, discussing travel, families, politics and life in general. My favorite “Roger story” (and the way everyone in my circle “knew Roger”) is the “novel” of information he provided me when he learned I was traveling to Turkey😊 That was my friend Roger in a nutshell: open, caring, sharing and one of the most lovely human beings I have ever met. You will be missed my friend and in my thoughts at each new travel destination. Love, Cindy

Rog and I have been friends since our teenage years when we met playing football for Holy Cross. Rog was a Centre Forward in the Gerd Muller mould - stocky, hard to mark and a great finisher; I was a Centre Back who modelled himself on the great Bobby Moore. Around that time (late 1960's) we both had boring jobs in Bristol , so we decided to pack them in - and travel. I had made various pen-friend contacts in Scandinavia so we offered to visit them! In those days, I was the more experienced traveller and it was Rog's first trip abroad. We went in my 1968 Mini 1000 and did over 4,000 miles with me driving and Rog as my navigator. Suffice to say that you dont travel that far in a Mini without getting to know one-another! We never got lost and developed one of the most important qualities in any friendship - that of TRUST. We never lost that feeling of trust for each other, so much so that I asked Rog to be Best Man at my marriage to Margaret and then many years later, made him an Honorary Scadding - a dubious honour, which Rog accepted!
We went our own career ways for a while but our friendship reignited when Rog moved back near Bristol.
I have lived in my beloved Chipping Sodbury for over 45 years and I know that Rog enjoyed his frequent visits here to meet up with Maggie and I - or 'M' and 'D' as he called us! We all know that Rog loved travelling but after our Scandinavia jaunt I got it out of my system as I was glad to get home whereas Rog got the bug - he wanted more and more of it. Our other main difference was that Rog was a Gashead and I am a -------- City fan! Still, I admired his loyalty to such a lost cause! Thankfully, we both supported Somerset County Cricket and had many happy days together at Taunton. We also shared interests in politics, current affairs, writing, Alfa Romeos and Rog was one of the few people I could talk to for hours without getting bored. I will miss him greatly but I am so grateful that I had such a wonderful friend for so long.

Roger was my client on the Channel Tunnel Rail Link (HS1) project. He never treated me as a consultant but as an equal and from that, our friendship grew. He was great to work for and with - he knew how to bring out the best in people, never dumped on his team, always gave praise where praise was due and had amazing attention to detail. And he was always funny, with dubious remarks delivered with that characteristic Roger twinkle of the eyes. By the end of the project, I thought of him more as a friend than a colleague.

We lost contact but got back in touch about 18 months ago. I’m so glad that we did. It felt like the intervening 25 years or so had just disappeared. I was chuffed that he shared some early drafts of his novel with me. Chatting with Roger covered so many topics - families, travel, sport, being a football Dad, and more recently, the novel. Always two-way, always interesting and always lots of laughter.

He will leave such a hole in many lives; I’m so glad to have known him.

I first met Roger in 1996 when I joined the Presidents Club at Bristol Rovers. We immediately became friends, and a few years later I became his accountant.
We later shared a box for several seasons in the West Stand, with his son Stephen forming a friendship with my son Luke.
Most months we would have breakfast together, always running out of time as our chats took us around the world, as well as chatting about sport and especially focusing on Bristol Rovers.
He was always professional in everything he did. From providing valuable consultancy services to the voluntary work he performed for many charitable events, you could always rely on Roger.
I will always remember he had the most beautiful handwriting.
We met up in 2016 in Hoi An in Central Vietnam and had the most wonderful two days together. He loved to travel, much further than most would venture, and always made friends along the way.
His knowledge of football and cricket was unmatched. I will be forever grateful that he was my friend, and I know one day I'll see him up the road.
The final whistle has been blown,
And the stadium lights glow dim,
Football was such a joyous time,
When standing next to him.
The Gas and football will play on,
This story has no end,
And there supporting from above,
Our much loved and loyal friend.
RIP Roger

I first met Roger over 30 years ago when he was my manager on the Channel Tunnel Rail Link - my first ‘proper’ job. He was fair, kind, fun and always had his staff’s backs although we did often tease him about his grammatical corrections to our work - he even ended up with the nickname “Roger Red Pen”! I also worked with him on the Thameslink Project before heading off in a different direction.

Despite no longer working in the same field we kept in touch and updated each other on our families, work and travel adventures - of which Roger had many.

In March this year we met up in France to visit an old colleague for a few days and I will always be grateful to have been able to spend that time with them both making memories which will last for a long time.

I will miss Roger as a manager but more importantly as a friend.

Juliet xx

Lovely memories of spending a few days with Roger and some of his pals at the Test match in Galle. I worked for Just Retirement at the time who sponsored the series, so we were able to access the executive box.

We shared many post match Cobras and Curries and the memories of the trip will stay with me forever.

Sleep well Roger, you were a good friend and a lovely person.

Condolences to your family who I am sure will have plenty of happy memories to get them through such a sad time.

Best wishes

Steve