The following year he was taken to Japan where he was held at the Kobe House and Nomachi prison camps until the end of the war in August 1945.
He wore a steel brace from his armpit to his hip and walked with a limp due to injuries suffered while a prisoner of war and at one stage was clinically dead until he was revived with a shot of adrenalin by Queenslander Dr Clive Boyce, a fellow prisoner.
After his discharge in 1946, he trained as a carpenter and joiner and prior to entering parliament ran his own building contracting business.
At the 1957 Queensland state election, Hooper, representing the Liberal Party, won the seat of Buranda by defeating the long-serving Labor member, Dick Brown.
[1] Leader Parliamentary delegation to Papua New Guinea and South East Asia 1974; Delegate General Conference Commonwealth Parliamentary Association Kuala Lumpur 1963; Executive Member Commonwealth Parliamentary Association (Qld Branch); Member Parliamentary Delegation to South East Asia 1968; Chairman Government Committee Inquiring into Consumer Affairs 1969; Member of the following Parliamentary Committees-Printing (1957-1969) Buildings (1960–1962); Standing Orders (1963–1971) (Ref Qld Parliamentary Handbook 1977 and family) On numerous occasions he was Queensland and Australian National President of the Ex-Prisoners of War Association and was awarded honorary life membership, a charter board member and later President of the Asthma Foundation of Queensland and long-term President of the Qld Training and Placement Centre for the Blind at Annerley and President of the Qld Deaf School Parents and Citizens Association and an Honorary Member of Coorparoo Lions Club.