From our beginning in 1890 (when Martin L. Haines started scooping cranberries in the wild) until 130 years and five generations later (when we now grow over thirty million pounds of cranberries a year), Pine Island Cranberry has remained a family business. Sadly, this week the Haines family lost a member of the fourth generation: Bill and Holly’s sister, Betty Ann McCoy.

Bett was born in Mount Holly in 1943 and grew up on the farm in Hog Wallow, working here every summer. A 1961 graduate of Oakcrest High School, she went on to receive a BS in journalism from the University of Georgia. Over the course of her career, she was the South Carolina bureau chief for the Augusta Chronicle and Augusta Herald before becoming the Hernando bureau chief for the Tampa Tribune, where she also wrote a weekly column. Eventually, she and her husband Aldo came back home, where she worked for the Press of Atlantic City and he worked at our equipment facility. Upon Aldo’s retirement in 2007, they returned to Florida.

Predeceased by her parents and her sister Kay, Bett leaves behind her husband of 35 years, Aldo McCoy; her son Scott Doerr and his wife Dawn; her grandsons Nick and Jason; her brother Bill and sister Holly; and numerous nieces and nephews.

Bett was smart and observant, two qualities that served her well during her reporting career. She took in the world with one raised eyebrow and always gave it to you straight. She worked hard; she was organized; she was funny, and most of all, she loved her family.

She will be missed.