Cole was born on March 31, 1994 at Northwest Hospital in Seattle, Washington.  He was the third child of Clay and Marta Baldwin and  brother to his older sister Briana and his twin sister Kayla.  He was a healthy and happy boy who loved playing football, baseball, video games, skateboarding and, most of all, his drums.   Cole once said that, for him, playing the drums was like breathing air.  He just had to do it.  Cole had a very outgoing personality and wasn't afraid to be the person he wanted to be.  He loved clothes and had his own unique sense of style and could be seen with anything from a shaved head to a three and a half inch bright red mohawk.  By the time Cole was twelve years old he was usually skateboarding to school and played on a baseball team with some of his best friends.  Cole was always number thirteen which remained his favorite number to the end.  He chose thirteen because no one else wanted it and he didn't think it was fair that it was known as an unlucky number.  Cole wasn't the best player on the team but he gave it his all every time and kept up team moral by telling funny jokes and pulling off prat falls on the field.  One of his favorite tactics for getting laughs was running into fences or walls and falling to the ground like he didn't know what had happened.   Cole was quite a handful in the classroom as well and enjoyed making the other students laugh by joking around.  Luckily for him, his teachers were very fond of him and put up with his silly antics.  Cole loved to play four-square and football during recess which was his favorite time of the school day and dreamed of being a famous cornerback on a NFL football team.  Champ Bailey of the Denver Broncos was his his favorite player of all time.  Cole was known to sit down and eat a full bag of green grapes by himself and loved barbeque chicken wings and pizza.  He was often the life of the party at family gatherings and birthdays and had a way of making people laugh.  Cole was just a great kid all around and everyone who knew him knew how special he was.

   On March 13, 2007, about two weeks shy of his thirteenth birthday, Cole woke up early to finish his math homework so he wouldn't have to stay in class during recess.  When he was finished, he put his papers away in his backpack, put down his favorite $100 bill pencil and fell asleep on the couch.  A short time after that, an aneurysm burst in his brain and Cole suffered a massive stroke.  Although the doctors did everything they could to save his life, he never regained conciousness.

   Cole was pronounced brain dead at Harborview Hospital on March 14, 2007 and the decision was made to donate his organs.  Through his gifts of life, Cole helped save five people's lives and his cornea's were put into a Sight Bank to be kept until a recipient could be found.  Cole's heart went to a fifteen year old boy, his liver to a nineteen year old young lady, his lungs to a fifty-nine year old woman and his kidneys to an eighteen year old young man and an older gentleman.

   "About a year after Cole passed away, we got to meet his liver recipient Annie.  It was the most amazing experience.  It made us realize that Cole's gifts had really made a difference in the lives of those he helped save and that felt really good.  To me, it felt like the hole in my heart was healing and I was able to feel really happy again for the first time since Cole's death.  Not long after that, we met Cole's lung recipient Judy.  Again, we were filled with the joy of knowing that Cole's legacy lived on in the lives of others.  Finally...We heard from the family of Cole's heart recipient Robbie.  Unfortunately, Robbie had passed away due to the development of Lymphoma, but his family was very grateful to have eight and a half extra months with him because of Cole's gift of life.  We have yet to hear from the kidney recipients but remain hopeful."       Marta Baldwin


 

                                     Click here to watch the story of Cole and Annie:
                                                                                             http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rg-S9bHkzhw