Wesley Travis Kennerly was born to Charles M. and Sarah A. (Travis) Kennerly in Conyersville, Tennessee on August 29, 1877. During the Spanish-American War, he served as a 1st Sergeant with Company L of the 1st Tennessee Infantry. Kennerly entered the University of Tennessee on September 29, 1899 and graduated as valedictorian of his Law Class on June 18, 1901. He married Ola D. Robertson on March 15, 1906, and the couple had two children, Robert Travis and Warren Wesley. Kennerly entered politics in 1906, serving as the Chairman of the Knox County Democratic Executive Committee (1906-1910), as a member of the Democratic State Executive Committee (1910-1918 and 1922-1924), as the Knoxville City Attorney (1912-1916), and as the U. S. Attorney for the Eastern District of Tennessee (1917-1921). He was also involved with the University of Tennessee, working as the President of the Alumni Association (1925-1926) and as a member of the Board of Trustees. Kennerly died on January 29, 1944.

John Bell Brownlow was born to William Gannaway "Parson" Brownlow, an ardent East Tennessee Unionist and editor of the Knoxville Whig, and Eliza O'Brien Brownlow in Elizabethton, Tennessee on October 19, 1839. He graduated from Emory and Henry College in Virginia and then served a long internship at his father's newspaper. During the Civil War, Brownlow commanded the Union's 9th Regiment of Tennessee Cavalry. After the war, he served as a special agent for the United States Treasury Department (1865-1866) and then worked for the United States Post Office. In 1904, Brownlow and his son, William G. Brownlow II, started Knoxville's first real estate firm, J. B. & W. G. Brownlow Co. John Bell Brownlow died in 1922.