[1][2][3] His father, Edmund William Cole, was a Confederate veteran and railroad executive; his mother, Anna Russell, was a philanthropist.

[4] Cole grew up at Colemere, a mansion in Nashville, with three half-siblings from his father's first marriage to a member of the McGavock family; his parents entertained often.

[8] In 1921–1922, when his railroad workers went on strike after their wages were lowered by 12 percent by the U.S. Railway Labor Board, Cole threatened them with dismissal and loss of their pensions.

[7][9] In retaliation, strikers went to his house on West End Avenue, and they "bombarded [it] with bottles until its concrete porch was littered with glass".

[6] He supported chancellor James Hampton Kirkland's decision to split with the Methodist Church.

[8] According to The Tennessean, he was opposed to "any move that made for a greater centralization of governmental power than was necessary to perform its proper functions".

[7] Cole married Mary Conner Bass, a direct descendant of Felix Grundy, in 1901.

[5] Cole died of heart disease on November 17, 1934, on a train in Cave City, Kentucky.

[6] Additionally, his portrait hangs in Kirkland Hall, the administration building;[6] it was donated by his son in 1958.