Background
Frank Thomas Hines was born on April 11, 1879 in Salt Lake City, Utah, United States, He was the son of Frank L. Hines, a mine superintendent, and Martha Hollingsworth.
Frank Thomas Hines was born on April 11, 1879 in Salt Lake City, Utah, United States, He was the son of Frank L. Hines, a mine superintendent, and Martha Hollingsworth.
Hines studied civil engineering at the Agricultural College of Utah in 1897-1898.
When the Spanish-American War broke out in April 1898, he enlisted as a private in the Utah Light Artillery. Shortly afterward Hines was promoted to sergeant, and in August 1898 he took part in the capture of Manila. During the ensuing war against the Philippine insurgents he saw action in numerous engagements, and in March 1899 was elevated to second lieutenant in the Utah National Guard. Hines was mustered out of the service in the summer of 1899. He returned to Utah and worked with his father.
Hines had come to like military life, and when the Regular Army was expanded in 1901 he was appointed second lieutenant. He spent the next ten years with the Coast Artillery, rising to the rank of captain in 1908. From 1911 to 1914 he was assigned to the office of the quartermaster general. While on furlough in Greece in the summer of 1914, he was put in charge of the embarkation of American citizens en route home.
Hines returned from Europe that fall and, after brief service in San Francisco, was a member of the Coast Artillery Board. In August 1917, Hines was assigned to the War Department general staff as assistant chief of the Embarkation Service, and the following January was named chief of that service. Successive promotions to brigadier general in the National Army quickly followed. As chief of the Embarkation Service, Hines developed the organization responsible for transporting American troops and represented the War Department in adjustment of transport matters with the Allies.
In April 1919, Hines was appointed chief of the Army Transportation Service, and in January 1920 he was promoted to brigadier general in the Regular Army. In August 1920 he resigned his commission to become director of operations for the Baltic Steamship Corporation. Hines's career in the private sector was short-lived, for in 1923, at the request of President Warren G. Harding, he took over the scandal-ridden Veterans Bureau. By cutting red tape, eliminating unnecessary expenses, and bringing good managers into its operation, he turned the Veterans Bureau--and after 1930 its successor, the Veterans Administration (VA)--into an efficient and tightly run agency. He opposed bonuses for World War I veterans and emphasized economy in veterans' programs by holding inviolable the principle that benefits should be closely related to the sacrifice incurred in service.
During the presidency of Franklin D. Roosevelt, Hines opposed many of the New Deal programs. Yet Roosevelt retained him as VA director, for Hines was a master bureaucrat, adept at cultivating the support of influential congressional leaders and maintaining good relations with veterans' organizations. In February 1944, Roosevelt gave him the additional job of director of the newly formed Retraining and Reemployment Administration (RRA). In this position Hines was responsible for developing and coordinating policies affecting military demobilization, war workers' and veterans' job placement, physical and occupational therapy, resumption of education, and vocational training.
As the end of World War II approached, Hines increasingly came under fire. Charges abounded that his zealous guarding of the public purse strings had led to an inadequate VA hospital program, and President Harry S. Truman felt that he was too conservative to bring the dynamism to the RRA that New Dealers desired. In the summer of 1945, Truman removed Hines from both agencies and appointed him ambassador to Panama. Hines's tenure as ambassador to Panama was dominated by negotiations for continued American use of sites in the Republic of Panama for defense of the Panama Canal. He negotiated an agreement, but in December 1947 the National Assembly of Panama rejected it. The rejection was largely a result of an upsurge in Panamanian nationalism, although Hines's critics charged that his "cavalier" negotiating methods, particularly his brusque, authoritarian manner, were a contributing factor. Hines resigned his ambassadorship in February 1948 and retired to private life. He died in Washington.
A dark, trim, balding man, Hines was quiet-spoken, undemonstrative, austere, hard-working, and scrupulously honest. He was widely respected as an informed, nonpartisan, and trustworthy administrator.
On October 4, 1900, Hines married Nellie May Vier; they had two children.