Barton County, Missouri Biographies-John Bryant COLE

History Of Hickory, Polk, Cedar, Dade And Barton Counties, 
Missouri, 1889.  Published by Goodspeed. Pages 871, 872

Hon. John Bryant Cole, attorney, and representative of Barton County, was
born in Kanawha County, W. Va., October 29, 1854, and is the son of Samuel
and Mary F. (Kennett) Cole, and grandson of John B. Cole, who was an 
extensive planter of Virginia, and who was the owner of many slaves, but
freed them all before the war.  He was of English descent, was in the 
Revolutionary War as commissary agent for the colonies, and was a man of
education.  He was a natural artist.  His wife was a relative of Gen. 
Stark, of Revolutionary fame, and was of Scotch descent. Samuel and Mary F.
(Kennett) Cole were married in Kanawha Valley, were they lived until 1866. 
In early life the father was a river pilot on the Kanawha, Ohio and 
Mississippi Rivers.  In 1866 he and his wife moved to Scotland County, Mo.,
and in 1883 to Lamar, where they are still residing, he in his 
seventy-second year, and she about sixty.  In their family were six 
children, three sons and three daughters.  Hon. John Bryant Cole, the 
second child of the above-mentioned family, received his literary education
in the district schools of Virginia, in T. J. Musgrove's private school at
Alexandria, Mo., and at the Missouri State University, graduating from the 
Normal course in 1874.  For about seven years he taught school, spending 
his leisure hours in the meantime in reading law under Judge Ben. E. Turner,
of Kahoka, Mo.  He later turned his attention to editing newspapers, ran 
the Kahoka Gazette a year, and then the Kahoka Democrat two years.  In 1881
he graduated from the law department of the Missouri State University, when 
he came to Lamar, opened an office, and continued alone in the practice of 
the law until 1888, when he formed a partnership with Capt. R. J. Tucker. 
He was nominated by the Democratic Convention for representative without 
opposition.  His work while in the Legislature aimed at the general good 
of the commonwealth, rather than his personal aggrandizement, and his 
efforts to avoid useless expenditure of public money.  His efforts in 
revising the statutes to remove the disability of married women, and to 
establish a Normal school at Lamar, Mo., deserve special mention.  October 5,
1884, he married Miss Bettie F. Musgrove, of Clark County, Mo., and the 
daughter of Prof. T. J. Musgrove.  To this union were born two children: 
Eldon R. and Mattie, the latter deceased.  Mr. and Mrs. Cole are members 
of the Baptist Church.  He is a Democrat in politics, and is one of the 
leading attorneys at the Lamar bar.

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