Editing Merian C. Cooper (section)

===World War I===
[[File:Cooper AEF death.jpg|thumb|Death statement from when Cooper was presumed dead in 1918]]
[[File:Merian Cooper.jpg|thumb|upright|right|Merian C. Cooper in [[Polish Air Force]] uniform]]
In October 1917, six months after the [[American entry into World War I]], Cooper went to [[Western Front (World War I)|France]] with the 201st Squadron. He attended flying school in [[Issoudun]]. While flying with his friend, Cooper hit his head and was knocked out during a 200-foot plunge. After the incident, Cooper suffered from shock and had to relearn how to fly. Cooper requested to go to [[Clermont-Ferrand]] to be trained as a bomber pilot. He became a pilot with the [[20th Aero Squadron]] (which later became the [[1st Day Bombardment Group]]).<ref name="living dangerously" />{{rp|26–27}}

Cooper served as a [[Airco DH.4|DH-4 bomber]] pilot with the [[United States Army Air Service]] during [[World War I]].<ref name="trueadventure">{{cite book |last=West |first=James E. |author-link=James E. West (Scouting) |title=The Boy Scouts Book of True Adventure |year=1931 |publisher=Putnam  |location=New York |oclc=8484128}}</ref> On September 26, 1918, his plane was shot down. The plane caught fire, and Cooper spun the plane to suck the flames out. Cooper survived, although he suffered burns, injured his hands, and was presumed dead. German soldiers saw his plane landing and took him to a prisoner reserve hospital.<ref name="living dangerously" />{{rp|8,38–41}} The death certificate on this page was sent to Cooper's family.  The Army had believed him killed but he was captured by the Germans and taken as a Prisoner of war (POW). Cooper's father received a letter from Merian around the time the death certificate arrived. Merian C. Cooper sent the copy back to the Army with the notation on top "In the language of Mark Twain Your death has been greatly exaggerated."<ref>{{cite web | url=https://catalog.archives.gov/id/7787194 | title=National Archives NextGen Catalog }}</ref>

Captain Cooper remained in the Air Service after the war; he helped with [[Herbert Hoover]]'s [[United States Food Administration|U.S. Food Administration]] that provided aid to Poland. He later became the chief of the Poland division.<ref name="american polish">{{cite web|title=Merian C. Cooper – Forgotten hero of two nations|url=http://www.americanpolishcooperationsociety.com/2016/01/merian-c-cooper-forgotten-hero-of-two-nations/|website=American Polish Cooperation Society|access-date=11 July 2016|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160812231834/http://www.americanpolishcooperationsociety.com/2016/01/merian-c-cooper-forgotten-hero-of-two-nations/|archive-date=August 12, 2016|df=mdy-all}}</ref> In the early spring of 1919, while supplying the besieged Poles in [[Lviv]] during the [[Polish–Ukrainian War]], he claimed to have first discussed US air support for the Polish eastern flank with General [[Tadeusz Rozwadowski]] who commanded the city's defence.<ref name="MP">{{citation |last=Patelski |first=Mariusz |title=Ochotnicy amerykańscy w wojnie polsko-bolszewickiej. Z działalności dyplomatycznej gen. Tadeusza Jordan Rozwadowskiego |journal=Zeszyty Historyczne |volume=132 |year=2000 |url=https://static.kulturaparyska.com/attachments/ca/20/77cbc141fc6025c952b1542002dc5d0b33c46231.pdf#page=217}}</ref>{{rp|218}}