Frank Smith

Who is Frank Smith?

Frank Smith, Jr., is a civil rights activist and politician in Washington, D.C. Born in Newnan, Georgia, he attended Morehouse College where he developed his appetite for activism. In 1960, he participated in the Rich's Department Store boycotts in Atlanta; and almost at the same time he was working with other students to establish the Student NonViolent Coordinating Committee. A founding member of SNCC, he is recognized by his SNCC peers as the first SNCC worker sent into Mississippi to register voters. Based in Holly Springs, Mississippi, he worked in some of the most brutal and racist counties in Mississippi. He was also one of the few SNCC workers employed in the original HeadStart program. Working with the Child Development Group of Mississippi, his Headstart Program was based in Jacksonville, Mississippi, in the heart of the Mississippi Delta. Frank worked with native Mississippi sharecroppers who had been evicted from their homes when they requested a pay raise in the men’s salaries from a flat rate of $6 day to $1.25 an hour. The sharecroppers, Frank and his first wife, Jean Smith, purchased land, lived in tents where they were regular and ongoing targets for the plantation owner and friends during the year when they built housing, and established one of the first black cooperative communities in Mississippi—Strike City.