Cooper, Lindsay Hughes

Ruth Lindsay Hughes was born in Bevier, Missouri on September 8, 1908, and she graduated from the University of Missouri-Columbia in 1931. She developed an interest in art from courses taken in college, and two years later she was able to secure a position at the as yet unopened Nelson Gallery of Art. She was initially hired to perform such tasks as sewing, dusting, and polishing. However, her industriousness and intelligence eventually convinced Paul Gardner to ask her to write guide books to some of the rooms, give lectures, write plays for children's classes, and develop a radio program to dramatize the collection. Later, when Laurence Sickman was hired as the curator of Oriental art, Hughes became his assistant. When Sickman was drafted into the Army during World War II, she took over as acting curator of Oriental art. Hughes resigned from her position at the Gallery in 1945, due to her impending marriage to Frank Cooper. They moved to New York where Lindsay took a job with the Asian art dealer C. T. Loo, whom she had become acquainted with through his connection with the Nelson Gallery. They later moved to California and then Iran, where she taught English as a Second Language. The couple returned to Kansas City in 1970 and Lindsay resumed her association with the Gallery as Sickman's assistant. She remained in this position for five years, until Sickman retired. Lindsay Hughes Cooper died on 16 November 1997, at the age of eighty-nine.