Anderson Cooper’s Father

We all know that Anderson Cooper’s mother is Gloria Vanderbilt, but not much has ever been written about his father, Wyatt Cooper. I’ve seen photos and read a few things about him because I’ve read a few biographies about Vanderbilt. But nothing in-depth. I was curious. I went to Fairleigh Dickinson University, at the Florham Park campus, which during the gilded age had been the Florence Vanderbilt Twombly estate. There was an elderly woman in one of my classes, and this woman’s mother allegedly once worked on the estate, and the woman played with Gloria as a child.The name, Florham Park, is a combination of Florence Vanderbilt Twombly and Hamilton Mcknown Twombly.

In any event, Anderson Cooper is doing a special, Roots: Our Journey Home, where he had a chance to look into his ancestry on his father’s side, along with other CNN anchors. He claims he never felt very close to the Vanderbilt side of the family and wanted to know more about his father. 

Cooper traveled to where his father was born and raised, in Mississippi, visiting old cemeteries, discovering stories of his ancestors whom had fought in the Civil War. But it was at his dad’s high school in New Orleans, where he made an exciting discovery: A school employee handed Cooper a folder containing his father’s report card from 1944.

You can read more here. The show airs on Monday, at 9:00, ET.

Joan Rivers’ Death

I’ve been following this story because I find the medical details so amazing. My own mom had the same procedure Rivers had several times this year and during one of them last July she had a heart attack. Thankfully, my mom was in Sloan Kettering in New York, only blocks away from where Rivers had her procedure done in a clinic instead of a hospital, and my mom was much luckier than Rivers because my mom was in a large hospital that was prepared for anything. We took her to Sloan because it was the best there was and we didn’t want to take any chances or assume anything. 

In any event, the New York medical examiner ruled that Rivers’ death was a result of “therapeutic complications.” In other words, during any “simple procedure” anything can happen, especially with an older patient.