re: With Leroy Gordon Cooper....
Cooper flew twice, Mercury Faith 7 and Gemini 5 , but not Apollo 7.
Sending ashes to space is mainly for surviving family members.
Perhaps, in the near future, a rocket could send messages, blood samples, hair of living persons, away from the solar system.
And that probe could also be used to study cosmic rays, the solar system inside the galactic environment, or even detect other planets around other stars using triangulation....plenty of possibilities.