March 5 Today in OPC History

On March 5, 1966, Pastor Glenn Coie of Sharon OPC, Hialeah died in a boating accident. With a group of young people he had gone to Naples for an outing with Pastor George Knight III and the young people from Covenant Presbyterian Church.

Starting out in good weather shortly after 11 o'clock in the Day Sailor, Knight and Coie and four young people sailed through a pass into the gulf. In turning about after a short sail up the beach the mainsheet fouled in the auxiliary motor and the 17-foot boat capsized before the line could be cleared. By that time the wind had picked up and they were drifting southward and away from where they might be spotted. Mr. Knight decided to swim to shore for help, and Mr. Coie, a good swimmer, and four girls, ages nine to seventeen, with life jackets, clung to the boat and were in good spirits. Mr. Coie succumbed, however, while still clinging to the boat, somewhat less than an hour after it had capsized. When the craft first turned over he had assisted in rescuing the youngest girl who was underneath. It may be that the extra exertion coupled with the strain of clinging to the boat as the waves increased to perhaps ten feet in the rising wind was too much for his heart.

A memorial service was held in Hialeah on the following Wednesday, led by the Rev. Robert Atwell of the Galloway Church, Miami and the Rev. LeRoy Oliver, general secretary of the OPC Committee on Home Missions and Church Extension. Interment was in Eugene, Oregon, with the graveside service in the charge of the Rev. Glenn Black.

A charter member of the Orthodox Presbyterian Church, Mr. Coie led some seventy charter members out of the Presbyterian Church in the U.S.A. in the fall of 1936 to form the Westminster Church in Bend, Oregon. From there he went to Knox Church, Silver Spring, Md., where he labored for more than a decade. After a shorter pastorate in Long Beach he returned to his first love as a home missionary in Hialeah.

Mr. Coie was the Moderator of the 31st (1964) General Assembly in Silver Spring, MD. His son, Robert, a ruling elder in the OPC, served as Moderator of the 70th (2003) General Assembly in Sioux Center, Iowa.

Picture: Glenn and Gladys Coie