Conception
Charles T. Cooksey, President of CTCGEO, is the inventor/innovator of TXO. He has merged his football participation and passion, a very diverse professional services career spanning 45 years, and his creative problem-solving mindset to pursue TXO.
The TXO seed was probably planted when Cooksey began participating in football at the age of eight, and became a passionate fan. As an athletically talented cornerback, Cooksey stood out in Pop Warner, high school, and college at Langston University. In his junior year he was "noticed" by NFL scouts and sports agents as a professional prospect. Unfortunately, a senior injury nullified continued interest but his passion for football sustained.
In 1978, Cooksey witnessed NFL New England Patriot Darryl Stingley suffer severe high-impact collision injuries during a preseason football game. That collision resulted in Stingley becoming a quadriplegic. It was due to that tragic event TXO concepts were very loosely developed.
Cooksey realized that new helmet innovations had to be developed to advance football safety. The helmet had to evolve to nullify vicious collisions that critically jeopardized players' necks. He anticipated that if significantly enhanced impact-mitigating safety football equipment was not developed, the game's popularity would diminish, restrictive legislation would be passed, and stifling revenue draining litigation would persist and financially cripple the game.
In successive years, while living in Chicago, Cooksey studied football related paralysis and deaths, career-ending concussions, and post-career dementia and Chronic Traumatic Encephalopathy (CTE). Cooksey’s new knowledge directed him to expand safety protection enhancements regarding the neck to include players’ heads and brains. He developed relationships with concussion awareness and CTE organizations such as the Sports Legacy Institute and the Chicago Concussion Coalition. And by fate, he met Stingley in the early 2000s, and became a friend while volunteering as the newsletter writer for the Darryl Stingley Youth Foundation.
Cooksey earned a MS in Product Design and Development Management at Northwestern University, and gained experience in Product Design/Development, Concept Design/Implementation, and IP Management. He is now collaborating with product industry advisers and consultants to deliver TXO to the global marketplace.