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Frank Smith Horne

American poet (1899–1974)

Correspondence, annotated notebooks and portrait silhouettes prepared for research
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Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionAug 20, 2026
Entity authorityQ55683599 ↗
Source-derived summary

Frank Smith Horne was an American lyricist, poet, and government official who was an influential figure in the Harlem Renaissance. He was a member of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt's Black Cabinet where he served as Assistant Director of the Division of Negro Affairs, National Youth Administration. Later, Horne worked for the Housing and Home Finance Agency and helped to found the National Committee Against Discrimination in Housing (NCDH).

Early life and education

Frank Smith Horne was born and raised in Brooklyn, New York by Edwin Fletcher Horne and Cora Calhoun Horne. He was raised Catholic and had three brothers, Errol, John Burke, and Edwin Fletcher Jr. Horne's father was a private contractor and builder. His parents were early members of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and well-known members of middle class Black New York.

Horne attended the City College of New York, graduating in 1921 with a Bachelor of Science. Horne received an optometry degree from Northern Illinois College of Ophthalmology in 1923. In 1932, he graduated from the University of Southern California with a Master's Degree.

Editorial summary

This brief starts where responsible research should: with the source description of “Frank Smith Horne” as american poet (1899–1974). Everything that follows is an evidence route, not borrowed authority.

Editorial reviewA productive starting point for separating a subject’s documented career from later reputation and commemoration. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1921, 1923, 1932—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1899-08-18. The account is most persuasive where Frank, Smith and Horne can be independently traced.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The subject matters to the people & ideas register because the source frames it as american poet (1899–1974). Its deeper value depends on whether names, dates, institutions and citations support that framing.

Evidence profile

Chronology provides the most reliable spine for this subject; interpretation should follow only after identities and dates are secure. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 20, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q55683599. VIAF identifies the subject as 78380349. The Library of Congress control number is no97016679. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1921, 1923 and 1932.

Critical limits

Later biographies can compress uncertainty and repeat inherited reputations, so apparently settled claims may still require comparison. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.

Best used for
  • Establishing names and roles
  • Building a first chronology
  • Locating cited institutions
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Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Frank Smith Horne”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Frank Smith Horne primary sources, Frank Smith Horne archive and Frank research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Frank Smith Horne”?
  2. Which claims depend on a single source or contested interpretation?
  3. Which primary records establish identity, chronology and institutional ties?
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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Frank Smith Horne” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.