Gulf War vet in N.C. chosen for home 'Extreme Makeover'

By Chuck Martin

Correspondent

JAMESVILLE, N.C.

Jeff Cooper knew Friday was going to be special as soon as he heard someone shouting outside, telling him and his family to get out of their house in northeastern North Carolina.

The voice behind the megaphone at 10 a.m. was Ty Pennington, host of ABC’s “Extreme Makeover: Home Edition.” Pennington came in his big, famously black and white bus to tell the Cooper family they were going to get a new home, no charge, built by community volunteers.

“My heart literally dropped to my feet,” said Cooper, 44, a disabled Army veteran, married to Clara, 40, with two children, Windy, 16, and Aaron, 13.

In the hit reality TV series, volunteers build new homes for deserving families in a matter of days. On Feb. 23, ABC announced it was going to produce an “Extreme Makeover” show in northeastern North Carolina. Many thought the house would be built in Edenton, a quaint little town in Chowan County where community volunteers rallied a week ago.

But the network, which is always tightlipped about where the new home will be located, instead chose the Cooper family in Martin County. Their doublewide mobile home, where they’ve lived for 15 years, is off a gravel road, surrounded by pine trees and fallow cotton fields.

Cooper served 11 years in the Army as a combat medic, including a stint during Operation Desert Storm in the early 1990s. He is now wheelchair-bound, suffering from Gulf War Syndrome and Multiple Sclerosis.

Just to make sure the family would be home Friday morning, ABC told the Coopers they were one of five finalists in the area. Local veterans groups nominated the Cooper family to get a new house, and ABC first contacted them nearly a year ago. ABC plans to air this episode in May.

“I’m overwhelmed,” said Cooper, a veterans’ rights advocate who has lobbied the North Carolina General Assembly. “We weren’t certain about anything, but we are glad we were chosen.”

The Coopers suffered two years ago when their son was hit by a garbage truck. Cooper used his medic skills to save Aaron’s life, but the teen still lost most of his right arm. Despite his hard luck and poor health, Cooper says he has no regrets about serving his country.

“I’d do it all over again if I could,” he said.

Citing her father as inspiration, Windy has already enlisted in the Army National Guard as a medical lab technician.

“I want to help finish what he couldn’t,” she said.

ABC is sending the Coopers on a weeklong vacation to Washington D.C. while their new home is being built. Even the family’s seizure-detection dog, Gabby, is making the trip.

Demolition on the Coopers’ home begins Sunday and new construction starts the same day.

“Once we demo, we’re rolling, there’s no stopping,” said John Norris, a Norfolk native and president of Edenton Builders, who is heading up the project.

Norris is relying on more than 6,000 skilled and unskilled volunteers working around the clock to build the house, which should be completed when the Coopers return next Friday. Some have called him crazy for taking on the “Extreme Makeover” project. But he’s glad he said yes when ABC called him nearly five weeks ago, asking if he would build a house in less than a week.

“A builder I talked to who has done this before told me, once you do this, nothing is impossible,” he said.

Norris and architect Jonathan White of Nags Head would not say how big the new home will be or what it will look like. White said the network gave him license to design the home as he saw fit. He promised it will be energy efficient and provide excellent access throughout for Cooper’s wheelchair.

“This will give us more freedom,” said Aaron, who will miss “nothing” about his old house, which had faulty wiring, a sinking roof and a rotting wheelchair ramp.

His sister agreed that more space will allow them to better function as a family.

“I miss being able to go into their rooms at night, pulling their blankets up to them and kissing them on the cheek,” Cooper said, his voice breaking. “Those are the kinds of things I’ve missed. That’s what I’m looking forward to.”

Chuckmartin1@embarqmail.com