She is best known for punching Dallas County, Alabama Sheriff Jim Clark in the face during the 1965 Selma to Montgomery marches.
A white man who wanted to lease part of Cooper's building asked that she segregate her seating, but she refused and revoked the sublease.
She lived in Kentucky, Pennsylvania, and Ohio before her incident with Jim Clark arose in Selma where voting rights were still being restricted.
Jim Clark, a local sheriff, was confronted by Cooper when she tried to defend a man who was attempting to register from being kicked by the police.
[5] She was held in jail for 11 hours before the sheriff's deputies dropped the charges and released her, hastened to protect her from being attacked by Clark upon his return to prison.
Her incident, as well as Bloody Sunday, which occurred six weeks after Cooper's encounter with Clark, were critical steps in passing the Voting Rights Act of 1965, which created mechanisms to prevent racial voter suppression.
Some popular headlines in newspapers such as the Lodi News Sentinel would be "Selma Sheriff Slugged by Hefty Negro Woman.
[14] In modern media, such as the 2014 film Selma, more light is shone on Annie Lee Cooper and her influential role as a woman during the civil rights movement.
The film also highlighted not only the struggles and success of Annie Lee Cooper, but of other Black women such as Coretta Scott King, Diane Nash and Amelia Boynton Robinson who played very important roles in the civil rights movement.