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This silver-haired Elko Independent owner/publisher was a 19-year Nevada legislator, serving in both houses. He wrote his “Hot Copy” column from 1937 until his death. He grew up in Sparks and was a 1929 journalism graduate of the University of Nevada.
Here is his obituary from the April 3, 1987 edition of the Las Vegas Review-Journal:
LONGTIME LEGISLATOR ‘SNOWY’ MONROE DIES
ELKO — Warren “Snowy” Monroe, former newspaper publisher and longtime state legislator, died late Wednesday, a day after announcing in his “Hot Copy” column he had pneumonia.
Monroe, a native of Rocklin, Calif., was 80.
He was a veteran of both the state Assembly and Senate and is survived by [omitted]. A memorial service was scheduled for 2 p.m. Saturday at Burns Funeral Home in Elko.
Monroe, whose white hair earned him his nickname of “Snowy,” was first elected to the state Assembly in 1940. He won re-election in 1942, left for service in World War II and returned to the lower house in 1946. After serveral years away from the legislature, Monroe was elected in 1958 to the state Senate, where he served through the 1975 session and wound up as president pro-tem.
Monroe also chaired the Nevada Fish and Game Commission and the state Democratic Central Committee, and served as president of various service clubs in the Elko area where he first bought the Elko Independent 50 years ago after graduating from the University of Nevada in 1929.
The weekly newspaper was sold several years ago, but Monroe continued to write his “Hot Copy” column, including a final column Tuesday in which he said he was checking into the local hospital with pneumonia. Monroe joked that he was going to have some “fun in the spring” at the hospital but promised he would be out golfing soon.
Monroe was a colorful figure during his time in the Legislature. A long standing foe of the 55 mph speed limit, he once drove a car so fast between Elko and Carson City that he beat an airplane making the same trip. In a telephone interview last month, Monroe termed the 55 mph limit “very, very ridiculous” and also admitted he got plenty of speeding tickets over the years.
