Charles “Tom” Coe, former owner of the Whitewater Register and the Palmyra/Eagle Enterprise, died Wednesday, Oct. 24. He was 74.
Coe ran the Register from 1982 to 2001, when he ended 128 years of family leadership by selling it to Southern Lakes Newspapers. The family also owned The Enterprise for two stretches totaling nearly 45 years.
Coe graduated from Whitewater High School in 1963, and served in the Army National Guard for a year before joining his father at the Register. He also was a member of the Whitewater Fire Department from 1968 to 2004, during which he served a stint as chief of the department.
