Frank Heffley

"Dag nab you rotten teenagers!"

- -Frank Heffley to adolescents knocking down his trash cans

Frank Heffley is one of the main characters of the Diary of a Wimpy Kid series. He is Greg's, Rodrick's, and Manny's unpredictable and serious father. He is the husband of Susan Heffley and the elder brother of Joe Heffley and Gary Heffley. He normally appears as a main character in the books, but he appears as a main antagonist in The Last Straw.

Personality
Frank is over-possessed, opprobrious, critical, over-reactive, shrill, irritable, easily-bothered, and emotional, but still a caring, delighted, well-meaning father who has a good heart. He always wants his kids to be strong and well rounded, such as supporting Greg's interest in weight lifting. He is constantly bothered and troubled by very small matters, such as Rodrick's typing skills and Greg's silly mistakes, and always want his sons to look good in front of his boss, a very small matter that Frank constantly gets worked up about; this shows that, like his son, he is shallow and worries about what other people think about him rather than what he thinks about himself. He is very serious and over-possessed in the fact that if his sons do something that irritates him ever so slightly, it makes him become incredibly serious, critical, and vituperative of their behavior.

He is a hard worker but has a poor relationship with all of his sons, since the three cannot relate to each other at all in any way possible, nor can they relate to Frank himself. Frank has a very strong interest in American history, proven by the fact that he builds a Civil War battlefield in his spare time. He does not let anybody into the furnace room where the Civil War battlefield is housed, as he is extremely cautious and attentive about what he lets people do to his battlefield and he thinks it can be easily ruined.

Greg also explains that his father can't buy anything without his mother's permission in Cabin Fever.

Book
The book's illustrations depict Frank with an elliptical face, wearing a tie and suit with a few strands of curled hair. Sometimes, Greg illustrates his father as wearing boxer shorts and a vest, but this is only when his father goes to bed. He also sometimes wears a cap on his head. Usually, at home, he does not wear a tie and suit.

Online
In the online version, he looks nearly the same, except that there are many little strands of hair on the back of his head.

Film
In the films, like everybody else in his family, Frank has rough brown hair and light skin. He usually wears business outfits, just like he does in the books and online version.

Trivia

 * Frank is hinted to be an office worker in many of the books, and he is shown to be working in an office in The Third Wheel, however the information on his profession and where he works remain unknown.
 * Frank is a junk-food addict, therefore implying that he may have a high cholesterol level. This is considered rather ironic as Frank is not depicted as being overweight. Although it's possible he may have a high metabolism.
 * Frank shows a deep hatred for heavy metal music and strongly disapproves of Rodrick's ambition to become a professional rock musician.
 * Despite spoiling their youngest son just as much as Susan, Frank seems frustrated with babying Manny so much—as depicted in The Last Straw, when Manny refused to give up his pacifier, Frank threw all away of Manny's pacifiers, forcing him to go cold turkey.
 * Frank also threw away Manny's blanket, Tingy, but in Frank's defense, it was an accident, as Greg figures that Frank didn't realize what it was.
 * If you look clearly on page 3 in Diary of a Wimpy Kid Movie Diary, Frank appears to be half-bald meaning Jeff Kinney originally didn't intend for him to have hair.
 * He is implied to suffer from gephyrophobia (Fear of bridges) in The Long Haul. He also gets dizzy when he drives over them but it is unknown whether the dizziness is a response to fear or if he's afraid because he's anticipating the dizziness.
 * In addition to his interest in assembling toy Civil Wars battlefields, Frank is also a Civil War reenactor, as depicted in the Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Dog Days (2012 film). He's shown to take the reenacting very seriously, wanting it to be as historically accurate as possible.
 * Frank's age is not revealed in the books however in Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules (2011 film) Greg mentioned that Frank and Susan could be at least 40.