Roger Allen Hornsby (1926-2009) received his B.A. degree at Adelbert College of Western Reserve University in 1949 and his A.M. and Ph.D. degrees at Princeton University in 1951 and 1952, respectively. He served in the U.S. Army from 1952 to 1954. On June 8, 1960 he married Jessica (Jessie) Lynn Gillespie, a professor of French at the University of Iowa.

Roger Hornsby joined the University of Iowa faculty in 1954. He served as chair of the Department of Classics from 1966 to 1981. During his career he was also active in numerous regional and national professional organizations. He was president of the Classical Association of the Middle West and South (CAMWS) in 1968-1969, and on the board of directors of the American Philological Association from 1974-1977. He was a trustee of the American Academy in Rome, a fellow of the American Council of Learned Societies, a trustee of the Vergilian Society, and served on the council of the American Numismatic Society. After his retirement he was named the Whichard Distinguished Professor at East Carolina University in 1997-1998.

Professor Hornsby had wide interests in the study of the ancient world and the teaching of the languages it spoke. His publications focused on Latin poetry and included Reading Latin Poetry (1967), Patterns of Action in the Aeneid (1970), and numerous articles and reviews in professional journals.

Roger Hornsby was born in Nye, Wisconsin on August 8, 1926, and died in Iowa City, Iowa, on October 20, 2009.