Grace M. Bolen was the oldest of two girls and two boys born in Kansas City, Missouri, to James Addison Bolen and Frances "Fannie" Mary Carter, who were married in June of 1882, the other siblings being James Griffith (3/20/1886), Frances Olivia (7/31/1891), Lorraine Leota (8/15/1892) and Marion Carter (10/25/1900). Two other siblings including one unnamed (1887) and Sheldon (1888-1888) died very young. Grace's death certificate cites an 1883 year of birth, but 1884, as cited in the 1900 census and on a passport application, is likely more accurate.

By the early 1890s the Bolens were fairly well off as her father ran Bolen Coal in Kansas City. The family was notable enough that Grace made the social pages in the Kansas City Journal and the Saint Louis Republic as early as age 14, around the time of her first composition submissions, often helping to entertain at parties or similar events. Grace and her mother were even subject to early versions of "who are you wearing" at some reported events.

Her first march, The Fair, was released by noted publisher Carl Hoffman when Grace was only 14, with two more appearing the following year. There may be a relationship to her discovery and the fact that she might possibly have taken piano from one of the piano teachers in the same building as Hoffman, facilitating knowledge of her compositions. The 1900 census showed Grace still at school, so she had not declared herself as a musician or composer, even with compositions in print. Newspaper accounts of the circles Grace ran in clearly indicated that she was being groomed for something different than just a composer of questionably moral music. The family had two domestic servants working for them that year.

It appears that Grace was sent for some schooling abroad. A passport application for April 16, 1900, states that she was a student traveling overseas, and that she would return "within two years." Where she went is unclear, as there were no indicators in the newspapers. However, she was clearly back by April of 1901 when a party was held in her honor.

Bolen's most famous piece, Smoky Topaz, was published by two former clerks of the Hoffman publishing house in 1901, Charles Daniels (aka Neil Morét) and Albert Russell, who had by then set up shop next door to their former boss. It is a gentle piece that evokes elements of both cakewalks and ragtime, and still frequently played by ragtime artists in the 21st century. When Whitney-Warner bought the Hoffman and Daniels & Russell catalogs in 1903 through Daniels' negotiating the sale of his own Hiawatha, Smoky Topaz was reprinted under the Jerome H. Remick logo. They kept it in their catalog for many years.

As was the case with so many promising women composers, Bolen's work ceased around a year before she was wed. Her first marriage was to William M. Louderman of St. Louis on Wednesday, January 7, 1903. In reports of preparations for the event Grace was called "one of Kansas City's most prominent belles, and is considered a beauty." The union, however, did not last very long and ended in a divorce in late December. Grace got married once again on December 3, 1904, this time to Matthew Charles Smith, an assistant manager of the Income Bond department of American Guaranty Company of Chicago. While it lasted a little longer, this marriage also failed. Neither of them were readily found in the 1910 enumeration.

On July 5, 1915, Grace married her third husband in Chicago, Illinois. Jay J. Davidson was a Missouri-born lawyer turned newspaper editor who had also been previously married and living in Los Angeles, California. The couple moved to Lafayette, Louisiana before 1917, where Grace gave birth to their daughter Frances Lorraine Davidson that February. His 1918 draft record indicates that Jay was working for the Press Publishing Company of Lafayette. The family was shown as residing in Lafayette for the 1920 census with no profession listed for Grace. They continued to reside there into the early 1930s. Jay passed on at age 57 on April 9, 1932 in Lafayette.

As of the 1940 enumeration Grace was living in Cheneyville, Louisiana, with her daughter Frances and son-in-law Lee Reynolds. No occupation was listed at that time. The 1950 census showed them in Jefferson Parish, Louisiana. In the early 1950s Grace moved to Kilgore, Texas with her daughter who had also remarried early in the decade. Then in 1956 she moved to nearby Longview, Texas. Grace taught piano and voice in both locations. Those who knew her affectionately called her "Mama Grace." Never having married again, she died of pneumonia at the age of 89 just as the second ragtime revival was gaining ground throughout the world. She is resting at Grace Hill Cemetery in Longview.