Frank Hopkins

Frank Hopkins
(unknown)
Born	Frank Hopkins 1895 (claimed 1865)
Died	1951 Lutheran All Faiths Cemetery, Middle Village, Queens County, New York City
Nationality	American

Frank Hopkins (born uncertain – died 1951) claimed he was an American professional horseman who at one time performed with the Ringling Brothers Circus. He was supposedly a legendary distance rider, claimed to have won 400 races, and was recognized by his contemporaries as supporting the preservation of the mustang. None of his claims can be proven and his birth is recorded in Pennsylvania as 1893.

Though the Disney film Hidalgo was based on Hopkins' purported story, his alleged exploits are most likely fictional. He has been described as a "fabulator and a confidence man whose tales of heroic deeds were little more than tall stories." Few items in his accounts have been verified by outside, reliable, third-party sources.

Hopkins said he was born to a Lakota mother and European-American father, that he grew up in both cultures, and that he learned to ride and care for horses at an early age. He claimed that his father, Charles Hopkins, was a scout for George Armstrong Custer and he was captured by Chief Gall in the Battle of the Little Bighorn, but he was released four months later and returned to Fort Laramie, which is where Frank said he was born and raised (his father being with Custer cannot be substantiated). The Fort Laramie National Historic site has no record of his birth or family. There is a marriage certificate that Frank Hopkins signed in Los Angeles in 1933 where he put his age at 43.

Hopkins claimed to have been a cowboy and professional horseman in the American West, where he gained a reputation for distance riding. In his autobiographical memoir (unpublished in his lifetime) and accounts to friends, he claimed to have been featured as one of the "Rough Riders of the World" in Buffalo Bill's Wild West show, which toured in Europe as well as the United States.

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