Scope and Content Note
The Service Men’s Arts Center and Contact Bureau of San Francisco Records span the years 1940-1946, with the bulk of the material dated 1942-1945. Charles Cooper, a concert pianist, and his wife, Marie, founded the center in 1942, with Cooper acting as executive director. The center functioned as an unofficial club and hospitality center for artists in the armed forces. Service members could use private practice rooms and studios to develop and keep artistic skills current, and Cooper arranged for private lessons, art supplies, literary agents, and concert performances for military service members stationed or furloughed near San Francisco
The collection includes cards that the Coopers used to inventory visitors’ interests and correspondence from service members around the world, some with discussions of the war. There are poems, photographs of students and their works, newspaper clippings, bulletins, and programs. A report related to the closing of the Service Men’s Arts Center in May 1945 is also included. A guest register lists daily visitors to the center, with signatures often including doodles, sketches, and musical notations.