Cook, the son of free blacks, attended the first classes at Howard University School of Law when the law school opened in 1869. Cook graduated from Howard Law in 1871,[1] and later returned to the law school to serve as the dean from 1877 to 1878.[2]
Cook’s son, Will Marion Cook, became a well-known composer who studied under Antonin Dvořák.[1] Cook’s sister, Cora Belle Jackson, was the first African-American graduate of the University of Chicago.[3]
