Anderson Cooper lost his dad as a child. 50 years later, an archivist sent him a video that left him in tears
Losing a parent as a child can be really hard. It isn't just the grief, but the loss of memories one might experience as they grow up. Anderson Cooper, an American Broadcast Journalist and the host of the show Anderson Cooper 360, had also lost his father as a young child. Cooper found it difficult to cope with the loss as he started forgetting the memories he shared with his father, Wyatt Cooper. But then, around 50 years later, he got an email from an archivist that helped him get some of the memories back, per an Instagram post from @allthereis. The video received over 1.3 million views.
The email had a clip from one of the interviews Wyatt had given during his lifetime and it helped Cooper remember a lot of things about his late dad. The broadcast journalist had been going through his dad's old photos for a couple of days. "He worked as an actor and screenwriter back in the 1950s, long before he met my mom," Cooper revealed. However, he felt like he was looking at a stranger because he didn't know a lot of things about his father. Cooper had also forgotten many of the things after he lost his dad back in 1978. "I've never had any videos of my dad as he was when I was a kid."
"I've struggled to remember how he moved, the look in his eyes when he talked," Cooper expressed. "Still photos don't give you that." But it changed a couple of weeks ago when Cooper received an email from an archivist. She had found an interview Wyatt had given for Mississippi Public Television and sent a link so Cooper could watch it. "I waited a few minutes, I was nervous. And then I clicked on the link. Suddenly, there he was, alive." In the clip, Wyatt was talking about how he was "home" wherever he was. "Because whether I am in a big city or country, I am the same person." He gave an example of how he went to Central Park in New York City with his kids.
"It's a marvelous place. We have a spring that belongs to us because only we know about it. We go there and we clean leaves out of the mouth of the spring," he continued. "And when the water gurgles gratefully out of the thing, we have affected it. We have something to do with the soil and with growing things." Cooper was grateful to watch his dad talk and move his hands, listen to and "connect" with the person he was speaking to. "I remembered the feel of those hands and the way he connected to me when we spoke." He could also remember looking into his dad's eyes and seeing the love in them.
Cooper revealed that he had forgotten about the spring in Central Park that Wyatt mentioned and that they used to go there. However, around six months ago, Cooper had found a stream close to his house and he went there with his sons, Wyatt and Sebastian, every weekend. He was happy to see the water "gurgle gratefully" out of the spring as he cleaned the leaves with his sons. Just like his dad did with him and his brother. "I see my kids with the same eyes he once saw me."