Ralph Dayton Cole Jr. (June 12, 1914 – September 2, 1999) was a Republican member of the

Ohio House of Representatives The Ohio House of Representatives is the lower house of the Ohio General Assembly, the state legislature of the U.S. state of Ohio; the other house of the bicameral legislature being the Ohio Senate. The House of Representatives first met in ...

. A graduate of

Williams College Williams College is a Private college, private liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts college in Williamstown, Massachusetts, United States. It was established as a men's college in 1793 with funds from the estate of Ephraim ...

and

Case Western Reserve University Case Western Reserve University (CWRU) is a Private university, private research university in Cleveland, Ohio, United States. It was established in 1967 by a merger between Western Reserve University and the Case Institute of Technology. Case ...

, he was originally elected to an

at-large At large (''before a noun'': at-large) is a description for members of a governing body who are elected or appointed to represent a whole membership or population (notably a city, county, state, province, nation, club or association), rather tha ...

district in 1954 to represent

Hancock County, Ohio Hancock County is a county located in the U.S. state of Ohio. As of the 2020 census, the population was 74,920. Its county seat and largest city is Findlay. The county was created in 1820 and later organized in 1828. It was named for John Ha ...

, and he would go on to serve seven more terms in the House. Throughout his tenure in the legislature, Cole served on various committees in leadership positions, most notably as chairman of the State and Government Committee. In 1968, Cole was appointed to a judicial seat for the

Ohio District Courts of Appeals The Ohio District Courts of Appeals are the intermediate appellate courts of the U.S. state of Ohio. The Ohio Constitution provides for courts of appeals that have jurisdiction to review final appealable orders. There are twelve appellate district ...

, and resigned prior to the end of his term. In 1981, Judge Cole also served as chief justice of the Ohio District Courts of Appeals, and also served on the

Ohio Supreme Court The Supreme Court of the State of Ohio is the highest court in the U.S. state of Ohio, with final authority over interpretations of Ohio law and the Ohio Constitution. The court has seven members, a chief justice and six associate justices, ...

when a substitute was needed. He would go on to serve for over twenty years, retiring from the bench in 1989. Following his service in the judiciary, he retired to his hometown of

Findlay, Ohio Findlay ( ) is a city in Hancock County, Ohio, United States, and its county seat. The second-largest city in Northwest Ohio, Findlay lies about 40 miles (64 km) south of Toledo, Ohio, Toledo. Its population was 40,313 at the 2020 United Sta ...

. He died on September 2, 1999.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cole, Ralph Williams College alumni Case Western Reserve University alumni Judges of the Ohio District Courts of Appeals Justices of the Supreme Court of Ohio Republican Party members of the Ohio House of Representatives 1914 births 1999 deaths People from Findlay, Ohio 20th-century Ohio state court judges 20th-century members of the Ohio General Assembly