“I got all excited,” she said. “He was a good man, a keeper.”
Coyle, an Army veteran, a longtime pressman for the Middletown Journal and community volunteer, died March 13 at Walnut Creek Nursing Center in Kettering. He was 98.
Coyle, 78, is the youngest of 11 children and there’s a 23-year gap between the oldest and the youngest, she said. The children were born two years apart until she was born five years later.
“They spoiled me rotten,” she said of her five sisters and five brothers. “I didn’t complain about that.”
Coyle served in the Army from 1948-1953, but due to a kidney injury he suffered playing high school football, he never saw any war time.
“He was always upset about that,” she said. His brothers served in World War II and his father, Robert, served in World War I.
Coyle worked as a pressman for the Middletown Journal for 30 years and at Raymond Bag Co. He also was a longtime volunteer at Middletown Regional Hospital, Atrium Medical Center and Holy Family Parish, his sister said.
“He loved to volunteer and was always willing to help someone,” she said. “He was very generous with his time. He was as good as gold.”
She said her brother worked out at a Middletown gym until he was 95 when his health started to decline.
Besides his sister, Susie, he’s survived by sisters Geri Knierim and Toni Seidl and numerous nieces and nephews. He was preceded in death by four brothers Bob, Tom, Dan, and Joe and three sisters Marie, Margy and Joan.
Visitation was held March 18 at Holy Family Parish, Holy Trinity Chapel, 201 Clark St., Middletown, followed by a Mass of Christian Burial with Father John Civille, Celebrant. Burial with military honors conducted by the Combined Honor Guard was held at Woodside Cemetery.
Arrangements were handled by the Swart Funeral Home, 207 E. Central Ave., West Carrollton.
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