San Francisco County
Biographies
RUSSELL HOPKINS COOL, D.D.S.
RUSSELL HOPKINS COOL, D.D.S., of Oakland,
was born in Jacksonville, Oregon,
June 12, 1858, son of Dr. George W. and Virginia M. (Pleasants) Cool. The
father born in Ohio, in 1828, was a son of an American,
who was a merchant that settled in Missouri.
The mother, born in Kentucky, in
1832, died in 1882. Doctor G. W. Cool was brought up in Kentucky,
graduated at a university, studied dentistry under Chapman A. Harris, a well
known dentist and one of the original founders of the Baltimore Collage of
Dentistry, whence he received his degree of Doctors of Dental Surgery. He came
to this coast in 1850, practicing first in British Columbia,
Washington Territory
and Oregon, and finally settled in San
Francisco, in 1881. His wife died in 1882, leaving
three children: William Pleasants, born in 1849, in Kentucky, and now a dentist
in San Francisco, married and has two daughters and one son; the next born was
the subject of this sketch; the next was George W. in British Columbia, in
1865, is a very successful dentist in Guatemala, married Miss Schuler of
Oakland and has one son and one daughter. Mrs. Virginia M. Cool was the
daughter of Daniel Pleasants, a planter of Virginia and
a descendant of Jon Pleasants, who came to America
in 1650, settling in Virginia.
The Great grandfather, James Pleasants, liberated his slaves, settling them in Ohio.
He was born in Goochland County, Virginia,
October 24, 1769 and died at his residence, “Contention,” in that county,
November 9, 1839. He was a first cousin of President Jefferson. He was admitted
to the bar of his native county, enjoyed an extensive practice, especially as
an advocate; was a member of the Legislature in 1796, elected by the
Republicans clerk of the House, 1803-11 and a Representative to Congress
1811-19, was United States Senator 1819-23, which position he resigned and was
Governor of Virginia 1832-5. In 1824 La Fayette visited Virginia.
Mr. Pleasants was a delegate to the Virginia State Constitutional Convention in
1829-30, and subsequently he declined appointment as Judge of the Circuit Court
and the Virginia Court of Appeals. The county of
Pleasants, now in Western Virginia,
was named in his Honor. John Randolph of Roanoke
said of him: “James Pleasants never made an enemy nor lost a friend.” His son
John Hampden, journalist, born in Goochland county
Virginia, January 4, 1797, died in Richmond,
Virginia, February 27, 1846, was educated
at William and Mary Collage and admitted to the bar at an early age, but
abandoned law for journalism, and founded and became editor of the Lynchburg Virginian.
He subsequently moved to Richmond
and in 1824 founded the Constitutional Whig and Public Advertiser, and was its
chief editor for twenty-two years. He was finally killed in a duel with Thomas Ritchie,
Jr., of the Richmond Enquirer, a Democratic organ. Mr. Pleasants was a
brilliant editor and paragraphist, and his journal was the principal exponent
of the Whig party in Virginia.
His Political sympathizers erected a monument to his memory, on which his
gallant and self-sacrificing patriotism is recorded.
Dr.
Cool, whose name introduces this sketch, graduated at the high
school of San Francisco
in 1874, practiced dentistry in 1875, followed a course of medical lectures in
the Collage of the Pacific, while studying dentistry in his father’s office,
and commenced practice on his own account in 1876 at Haywards.
In 1879 he came to Oakland. In 1881
he graduated in the dental department of the University
of California. In June, 1890, he
was elected Vice- President of the Post-Graduate Dental Association of the United
States. He is also a Member of the
California Odontological Society, and belongs to Brooklyn Lodge, No. 222, F.
& A. M.
The
Doctor was married in January, 1879, to Miss Lou Emerson, and has one child,
Dicka, born November 6, 1880, n Haywards.
Transcribed by Kim Buck.
Source: "The Bay of San
Francisco," Vol. 2, Pages 530-531,
Lewis Publishing Co, 1892.
© 2006 Kim Buck.
California
Biography Project
San
Francisco County
California
Statewide
Golden
Nugget Library