Cyril Ellwood Cole
Section 54, Lot 780
Mount Pleasant Cemetery, Toronto
Cyril Cole was a member of the Toronto police department in 1949 when the S.S. Noronic, a Great Lakes cruise ship, caught fire and burned on Toronto’s waterfront. In the ensuing inferno, 119 American tourists died. The death toll could have been far higher, were it not for the efforts of Cyril Cole who, with no thought for his own safety, plunged again and again into the water beside the burning ship and pulled out 23 to 27 people. Cole joined the police department in 1936, and through the course of his career, worked as a beat cop, plainclothes detective on the morality squad, head of the arson squad, and as a detective in the criminal investigation bureau. In 1975, his proudest career moment came when he was chosen to head the Metro Police College. He held the post until 1981, and felt that teaching was the most rewarding aspect of his job. Cyril Ellwood Cole died on July 28, 1994 at his retirement home in Victoria, B.C. He was 77 years old.