‏Caroline Francke‏

Caroline Francke was born on 19, July, 1899, at Far Rockaway, a neighborhood in the New York City borough of Queens. Caroline and her sister Katherine were raised by their mother Caroline, a divorce who worked as a private secretary in Essex, New Jersey.

Francke attended the Connecticut College for Women and had studied playwriting at Columbia University before finding success on Broadway and in Hollywood. She is probably best remembered for her 1928 play, "Exceeding Small", and an unproduced play that became the movie, Bombshell (1933), starring Jean Harlow. In the 1940s she worked as a script writer for the popular "Henry Aldrich" radio series.

Caroline Francke died from a cerebral hemorrhage on 22 May 1960, at Woodstock, New York, the birthplace of her husband, artist Kenneth Downer (1903-1975). Along with her husband, an adopted daughter and her sister also survived. Her last production, "The 49th Cousin" debuted on Broadway just three months after her death.