A little insight here would help.....

In one sense, a fact is just a proposition pertaining to reality. Under this view, facts can be either true or false. This is how I’ve seen logicians typically treat the term.

William,

Your understanding of “fact” seems to resemble that narrow Objectivist view of fact: a fact is a true proposition. That’s fine, and just to clarify, “narrow” is not meant to be insulting. It’s used to contrast “broad.” I think some logicians accept the existence of “false facts” because they are more concerned with the form of propositions. For example, “Lincoln was shot in 2005” is in the form of a factual proposition, but it is false. Not a big deal. We shouldn’t get bogged down in word choice. The use of the word is what matters. 

Something is either a fact, or it isn't. Just because a fact isn't proven, or hasn't yet been proven doesn't make it any less a fact.

Here I think you have conflated propositions with their referents. It’s common to do, and it’s usually inconsequential, but occasionally it leads to confusion. I suspect we’ll agree that a proposition is either true or false because its referent either obtains or does not obtain. For example, “Lincoln was shot in 2005” is a false proposition because its referent does not obtain (because Lincoln was really shot in 1865). If you want “fact” to refer to the referent of a proposition, then while we may qualify a “fact” as something that exists or does not exist, it doesn’t make sense to qualify that “fact” as true or false. Truth and falsity pertain to propositions, not to their referents.

Using the narrower Objectivist view of “fact,” here’s how I would reword that proposition of yours which I quoted above: Even if we don’t know whether a proposition is a fact (i.e., whether it’s a true proposition), that doesn’t make it any less a fact. The truthfulness of a proposition obtains independently of our knowledge of it.

Jordan

Something is either a fact, or it isn't. Just because a fact isn't proven, or hasn't yet been proven doesn't make it any less a fact.

Jordan replied, "Here I think you have conflated propositions with their referents. It’s common to do, and it’s usually inconsequential, but occasionally it leads to confusion."

I disagree  Propositions can refer to facts, but propositions are not themselves facts. 

Jordan continued, "I suspect we’ll agree that a proposition is either true or false because its referent either obtains or does not obtain. For example, 'Lincoln was shot in 2005' is a false proposition because its referent does not obtain (because Lincoln was really shot in 1865). If you want 'fact' to refer to the referent of a proposition, then while we may qualify a 'fact' as something that exists or does not exist, it doesn’t make sense to qualify that 'fact' as true or false. Truth and falsity pertain to propositions, not to their referents.'

Right.  But I think that the strict, philosophical view of "fact" is the latter.  A fact is the referent of a proposition.  As Jordan acknowledges, it is truth that depends on a proposition, not fact.

Jordan continued, "Using the narrower Objectivist view of 'fact,' here’s how I would reword that proposition of yours which I quoted above: Even if we don’t know whether a proposition is a fact (i.e., whether it’s a true proposition), that doesn’t make it any less a fact. The truthfulness of a proposition obtains independently of our knowledge of it."
 
Again, a proposition is not a fact. Propositions can refer to facts, but facts exist independently of propositions.  I would, however, agree that the truthfulness of a proposition can obtain independently of our knowledge of it, although, interestingly enough, Ayn Rand apparently did not.  Here is a passage from her correspondence with John Hospers.  She writes:

"You object to my definition 'Truth is the recognition of reality,' and you say: 'No--for truth may not be recognized....  There are truths even when nobody knows them and nobody recognizes them.  Many things are true about the world which nobody yet knows.'  Aren't you confusing 'truth' with 'facts'?  'Truth' is a concept that refers to epistemology, not to metaphysics; to consciousness, not to existence or reality.  'Facts' cannot be 'true' or 'false'; facts are ('existence exists').  'Facts' are the standard of truth or falsehood; it is by means of 'facts' that we determine whether an idea of ours is true or false.  'Truth' is the attribute of an idea in somebody's consciousness (the relationship of that idea to the facts or reality) and it cannot exist apart from a consciousness.  You say, 'There are truths even when nobody knows them and nobody recognizes them.  No, there are 'facts' even when nobody knows them and nobody recognizes them; these 'facts' are potentially the material of truths.  The recognition of these 'facts' by some human consciousness constitutes 'truths.'  You say: 'Many things are true about the world which nobody yet knows.'  Isn't this a colloquial, verbal foreshortening, which is inexact?  To be exact philosophically, one would have to say:  'Many facts exist in the world, which nobody yet knows, and when somebody discovers them, he will be able to form many true ideas which nobody can form at present."

Rand is correct that truth is an epistemological concept, not a metaphysical one - that it is an attribute in someone's consciousness and cannot exist apart from a consciousness.  However, I believe (along with Hospers) that her definition of 'truth' as "the recognition of reality" is not correct, for it implies that in order for an idea to be true, one must recognize the fact(s) of reality to which it corresponds.  Rand's definition equates truth with knowledge, whereas an idea can be true - can correspond to a fact of reality - even when the idea does not constitute knowledge of that fact.  For example, suppose someone were to entertain the proposition, "There is life on Venus."  If life did in fact exist on Venus, then that proposition would be true, even if no one had yet discovered or recognized that life exists on Venus.

So I agree with Rand that truth, unlike fact, is epistemological rather than metaphysical, but I disagree with her that it necessarily constitutes the recognition of reality.  To Rand's credit, she did endorse the correspondence theory of truth, which states that in order to be true, an idea or a proposition must correspond to reality.  But an idea can correspond to reality without constituting the recognition of reality.

Bill Dwyer