Former Pacific Palisades resident Sarah Wedgwood Cooper passed away on August 30 after a long bout with cancer. Her husband, Louis, was at her bedside. She was 76.
Born in Mt. Kisco, New York, on April 27, 1937, Sally was the eldest daughter of Rebecca Eaton Wedgwood and Hensleigh Cecil Wedgwood. She attended Oakwood Friends School in Poughkeepsie and graduated from the College of Wooster in Ohio, majoring in geology. She worked at the Cleveland Plain Dealer and later the Cleveland Drug Company until she married Martin White Rossney of Glen Ridge, New Jersey.
Martin and Sally moved to Pacific Palisades in 1970, where they raised their two sons, and she embarked on a real estate career. After her divorce from Martin, Sally met the love of her life, Lou Cooper, and they married in a cliff-side ceremony in the Palisades—under the second eucalyptus tree from The Point on Via de las Olas at Mt. Holyoke.
After working as “house parents” in several group homes for teenage offenders in the barrios of Los Angeles, Lou and Sally moved in 1990 to Maine to her family’s summer home in Sargentville, where she had spent almost every summer of her life, and later became inn keepers at the Red House on Little Deer Isle where they lived.
Sally was an avid gardener, enthusiastic bridge player, strong tennis player, devoted cellist, sang in the Bagaduce Chorale for many years, volunteered at the Bagaduce Music Lending Library, appeared in numerous community musical theatre productions, was a member of the board of the Blue Hill Co-op, was the longtime secretary and recent honorary trustee of the Sedgwick-Brooklin Historical Society, a life-long member of the Sargentville Thursday Club and a member of the Rosebuddy Club.
Sally will be remembered for many things, but mainly for her amazing spirit and positivity, her friendliness, creativity and willingness to help everyone, her strength and her razor-sharp wit. She had a huge circle of friends and family who will miss her enthusiasm intensely.
Sally is survived by her two sons, Robert Brophy Rossney II of San Francisco and Michael Wedgwood Rossney (wife Michele-Marie Levesque) of Maine; grandson Jasper Wedgwood Rossney of Maine; her large extended family; and her devoted and loving husband and life partner, Louis, also of Little Deer Isle.
Contributions may be made in her name to the Bagaduce Music Lending Library, 5 Music Library Lane, Blue Hill, ME 04614. A celebration of Sally’s life will take place October 20 in Sargentville.
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