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The phrase “success has many fathers, but failure is an orphan” has echoed through the millennia. It’s an old idea, yet still resonates today. The historian Tacitus once said, “This is an unfair thing about war: victory is claimed by all, failure to one alone.” This timeless wisdom came to life again as Governor Kay Ivey announced on Friday that the U.S. Department of Transportation (USDOT) has awarded a $550 million discretionary grant from the Bridge Investment Program to the I-10 Mobile River Bridge and Bayway Project.
With this substantial funding, the success of the River Bridge and Bayway Project shines brightly under Gov. Ivey’s visionary leadership. But let us not forget John Cooper, the often maligned Director of the Alabama Department of Transportation. Cooper has been criticized, ridiculed, and, in common parlance, booed, screwed, and tattooed for relentlessly championing the project.
Where are the critics and naysayers now? They are either praising the project as if they had never spoken against it or hiding out of sight, hoping no one in the media asks them for a comment.
In June 2023, I penned a column asking, “Where will John Cooper go to get his reputation back?” This was a nod to Raymond James Donovan, the U.S. Secretary of Labor under President Ronald Reagan, who was dragged through the muck by Democrats and the press, becoming the poster boy of Reagan’s “corrupt” conservative administration. In the end, Donovan was exonerated after years of investigations and false allegations.
Yet, in multiple press releases praising the $550 million discretionary grant from USDOT, Cooper’s name is conspicuously absent. Not a single mention of the man who bravely soldiered on with the I-10 project while being pilloried in the press and in court.
I am reminded of Theodore Roosevelt’s “The Man in the Arena” speech:
“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”
The title, “The Man in the Arena,” was also used for the documentary series about football legend Tom Brady’s time with the New England Patriots. In a tweet announcing the series, Brady wrote, “I have quoted Theodore Roosevelt’s ‘Man in the Arena’ speech since I saw it painted on our weight room wall at UM in 1995. It’s a constant reminder to ignore the noise, buckle my chinstrap, and battle through whatever comes my way.”
Gov. Ivey knows this sentiment all too well, being counted out on occasion only to come back and win through persistence. John Cooper knows this, too.
Well done, John Cooper. You deserve many accolades for your vision and steadfastness in the face of adversity. Your laurels may yet await you as the resilient architect.
