William E. Cole: An Exemplary Social Servant

William Cole's career at the University of Tennessee spanned nearly a half century during which he distinguished himself as a professor of sociology, head of the Department of Sociology, an active researcher and writer on scholarly subjects, and an energetic community leader. Reflecting on his first three decades at UT, Cole once said: "I have always tried to interpret and take seriously UT's three objectives--instruction, research..., and public service." But of the three, teaching was "his passion and his life." The observation was that of his colleagues, but it was undoubtedly seconded by the hundreds of students whom Cole taught during his academic career. Not surprisingly, after retirement, he volunteered to fill in as an unpaid substitute for other members of the sociology faculty if they had to be absent from the campus. When the University began offering a series of seminars on retirement planning for its active faculty members, Cole was held up as a model and addressed the seminar on the fulfillment that could be experienced by retirees. Cole himself was the model retiree!

Born on July 28, 1904, in Shady Valley, Tennessee, Cole attended Maryville College for a year. His goal was the University of Tennessee, but he had some trepidation about entering such a large institution. A year at a smaller college would help him bridge the gap between his small high school and a major state university. Cole transferred to UT in 1924, expecting to major in sociology, but when he found only three courses on that subject in the curriculum, he shifted to agricultural education and bacteriology.

Upon graduation from UT in 1926, Cole spent a year as an assistant in the College of Agriculture before heading on to Cornell for graduate work. Cole later explained that his choice of that Ivy League school was influenced by his admiration for three of his UT professors, all of whom had received their own graduate education at Cornell: Lex Hesler in botany and Nugent Fitzgerald and Adams Phillips in agriculture. Cole received his Ph.D. in 1930 and joined UT the same year. After teaching bacteriology for several years, he joined the fledgling Sociology Department and in 1936 was named its head.

During the next forty years, Cole oversaw a veritable explosion in the number of curricular offerings in the department and the initiation of an undergraduate major and master's and doctoral programs. By the time Cole's tenure ended in 1965, the department was offering more than twenty-five courses at the undergraduate level and over fifty on the graduate level.

While strengthening the department, Cole continued his own research and writing, serving as author or co-author of over twenty books and penning numerous articles, reports, and chapters in books. He was a specialist in urban and regional sociology, particularly pertaining to the Southeast. Some of his works included Tennessee: A Political Study (1940), Urban Society (1958), and Introductory Sociology (1962). Cole and other prominent sociologists joined to found the Southern Sociological Society in 1935 to encourage sociological research on the South. Eventually, the Society shifted to the broader objective of promoting the discipline of sociology. In this organization, Cole held the office of first vice-president in 1939, became a member of the Executive Committee in 1941, and was elected president of the organization in 1942.

All the while, Cole continued to indulge his devotion to teaching. "I always taught a heavy load because I love to teach," he once said. But he also devoted countless hours to public service.

Cole applied his knowledge of sociology to problems outside the classroom, such as racial tensions, juvenile delinquency, crime, urban living, and aging. From 1943 to 1947, Cole served as chief of the Program Review and Analysis Section of the Tennessee Valley Authority. He worked with a variety of local and statewide organizations to improve the quality of life for Tennesseans, helping to organize the Tennessee Department of Public Welfare and the United Way of Knoxville and serving as a member and eventually chairman of the Tennessee Commission on Aging.

Cole's most memorable community service came with the Knoxville Metropolitan Planning Commission (MPC), of which he was a founding member and chairman from its establishment in 1956 until 1977. This was a demanding task, of which Cole once remarked: "Dale Carnegie wrote a book on 'How to Win Friends and Influence People,' but I can tell you how to lose them in seven words--become a chairman of a metropolitan planning commission." Before being named to the MPC, Cole had been a member of the Knox County Planning Commission, in which role he advocated the unification of Knoxville and Knox County governments. During the 1960s, Cole was instrumental in structuring Knoxville's largest federal program of urban renewal, which included the development of the University's west campus.

Cole's work did not go unrecognized. He received community service awards, was named the 1959 Phi Kappa Phi lecturer at UT, was designated an Alumni Outstanding Teacher at UTK for 1970, and received an award of merit from the UT College of Education. He was also elected president of the Tennessee Conference of Social Work and named a Fellow of the American Sociological Association.

Mrs. Diana Harris, who co-authored with Cole The Elderly in America (1977) and the Sociology of Aging (1980) remembered that students never said, "I like Dr. Cole." They always quipped, "I love Dr. Cole!" Soft-spoken, kind and considerate, with a warm and engaging personality, Cole had a great sense of humor and enjoyed his work. He considered UT "the greatest place in the world." Dr. Thomas Hood, a later head of the Sociology Department, reminisced that one of Cole's principal talents was instilling confidence in doubtful graduate students and encouraging them to complete their degrees.

In 1965, Cole vacated the chair of the Sociology Department but remained an active member. He retired nine years later but continued to research and write. One of his proudest creations, Tales From A Country Ledger, a recollection of his youth in Shady Valley, was published in 1979. Although officially retired, Cole maintained an office on the ninth floor of McClung Tower, often reporting to work at 8:00 a.m. during the week and spending half of Saturday in his office. It was here that he suffered a heart attack while doing what he had always done, fulfilling his obligation as a scholar/teacher. He died shortly thereafter, on March 14, 1979. That day, an anonymous note appeared on the door of the Department of Sociology, reading "Today Bill Cole died. Skies cried. On earth our loss is Heaven's gain, but grief is universal."