He joined The Century Magazine as an associate editor and became its editor-in-chief in three years, which gave his views on education a wide audience.

[1][2] In college, Frank joined the yearbook and literary magazine (later becoming the latter's editor), acted and debated, and won two oratory contests.

[2] One of Frank's columns, "Christianity and Racialism" (1924), strongly criticized both the Ku Klux Klan and the advocacy of "Nordic Race" supremacy popular at the time.

[5] Zona Gale, a Regent, was familiar with Frank through her fiction published in Century and asked him in April 1925 about filling the University of Wisconsin–Madison's presidency.

[1] Frank declined to resign and the Board held public hearings on his presidential competency before narrowly voting to remove him from office on January 7, 1937.

[1] Upon leaving UW–Madison, Frank joined Wisconsin political causes and began a bid for the Republican nomination for Robert M. La Follette, Jr.'s United States Senate seat.