June 2, 1943: The Death of Nile Kinnick

June 2, 1943, 80 years ago: Ensign Nile Kinnick is killed in a U.S. Navy training flight. He was a month short of his 25th birthday.

Nile Clarke Kinnick Jr. was born on July 9, 1918 in Adel, Iowa, the grandson of George Clarke, a Republican who served as Governor of Iowa from 1913 to 1917. His family were devout Christian Scientists, and, while Nile Jr. was already a sports star at Adel High School, Nile Sr. got a job in Omaha, Nebraska, and the family had to move. At Benson High School, he won a State Championship in baseball, and starred in basketball.

But his best sport was football, and he chose to attend the University of Iowa, supposedly because their program, then in a down period, would represent a better test for him than his other major option, the University of Minnesota, then one of the best programs in the country -- and Iowa's arch-rival.

Iowa still struggled, going just 1-7 in his sophomore year, 1937. (Freshmen were not eligible for varsity sports under NCAA rules until 1972, with occasional exceptions, such as during the upcoming World War II.) They went 1-6-1 in 1938. Head coach Irl Tubbs was fired, and Eddie Anderson was lured away from Holy Cross in Massachusetts.

He turned the team around in just 1 year: Iowa went 6-1-1, beating South Dakota and Indiana at home, losing away to Michigan, then winning away to Wisconsin and Purdue, beating then-Number 3 Notre Dame and then-Number 20 Minnesota at home, rising to Number 9 in the country, before closing the season with a tie away to Northwestern.

The loss to Michigan cost Iowa the Big Ten Conference title, throwing it to Ohio State, whom Iowa did not play. They did not receive an invitation to a bowl game. But the Notre Dame game became their signature win, and it was recognized as Kinnick's signature performance, scoring Iowa's only touchdown and pinning Notre Dame deep in their own end zone with a late punt, to secure a 7-6 win.

Kinnick was awarded the Heisman Trophy. In his acceptance speech, he said:, "I thank God I was warring on the gridirons of the Midwest, and not on the battlefields of Europe. I can speak confidently and positively that the players of this country would much more, much rather struggle and fight to win the Heisman award than the Croix de Guerre." Another writer cited a pair of famed speechmakers from classical times, saying that his remarks "tackled Demosthenes and threw Cicero for a 15-yard loss."

He was elected student body president, maintained a grade-point average of 3.4, and gave the commencement address for his Class of 1940. That Summer, he played for the College All-Stars in the Chicago College All-Star Game at Soldier Field, losing to the defending NFL Champion Chicago Bears, 45-28.

But he never played football again. The NFL version of the Brooklyn Dodgers drafted him, but he turned down a $10,000 salary to go to the University of Iowa College of Law. He also served as an assistant coach at Iowa in the 1940 and '41 seasons, as the team went 4-4 and 3-5, respectively.

He spoke before the Young Republicans, and introduced Wendell Willkie, the 1940 Republican nominee for President, at an Iowa campaign rally. An Iowa newspaper, the Marion Sentinel, endorsed him for the 1956 Presidential election, the 1st in which he would be eligible, having met the minimum age requirement of 35.

He enlisted in the U.S. Naval Reserve, and reported for induction -- 3 days before the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. He received leave to visit his family in Omaha in September 1942, and attended Iowa's season opener, at home at Iowa Stadium in Iowa City, a 26-7 win over Washington University of St. Louis.

On June 2, 1943, Ensign Nile Kinnick was stationed aboard the aircraft carrier USS Lexington, off the coast of Venezuela. He was on a routine training flight in a Grumman F4F Wildcat, when it developed an oil leak. Radio contact was made, determining that he was 4 miles from the carrier, and was forced to carry out an emergency landing in the water. Rescue boats arrived 8 minutes later, but they found only an oil slick.

His body was never recovered. It took until 1996 for the plane to be found but, given that he might have still been inside, it was decided not to disturb the site.

A legend developed that the deck of the Lexington was covered with planes preparing to take off, and that trying to land on it would have caused an explosion that would have killed many of his crewmates, so Kinnick sacrificed himself to save them. The Navy later determined that it wouldn't have mattered: He couldn't have reached the carrier anyway, so the choice was out of his hands.

With the award's establishment in 1935, he was the 1st winner of the Heisman Trophy to die. There wouldn't be another until 1963, when 1961 winner Ernie Davis of Syracuse died from leukemia.

For nearly 30 years, Nile Kinnick Sr., having outlived his son, refused all requests by the University of Iowa to honor his son, not wanting to single him out over all other students who died in World War II. Finally, in 1972, he consented to the renaming of Iowa Stadium, which opened in 1929, as Kinnick Stadium. It remains the only stadium in American college football named for a Heisman Trophy winner. A statue of Kinnick was placed outside in 2006. His Number 24 was retired. The school plays an excerpt from his Heisman Trophy acceptance speech at every home game, before playing the National Anthem.

The coin flipped at the start of every Big Ten football game bears his image. He was a charter inductee into the Iowa Sports Hall of Fame in 1951. That same year, he was elected to the College Football Hall of Fame. In 1999, Sports Illustrated named him Iowa's 3rd-greatest sports figure, behind only wrestler and wrestling coach Dan Gable, and Cleveland Indians pitcher Bob Feller, who had been on a youth baseball team with Kinnick.

Feller, also a U.S. Navy veteran, went to his grave believing that, had he lived, Kinnick would have been elected Governor of Iowa, and would have beaten John F. Kennedy in the 1960 Presidential election. 

August 14, 1945: V-J Day + 75

 

August 14, 1945, 75 years ago today: V-J Day, Victory over Japan. Afraid of the United States of America unleashing further nuclear devastation, as on the cities of Hiroshima on August 6 and Nagasaki on August 9, the Empire of Japan surrenders to the Allies, ending World War II. V-E Day, Victory In Europe, had been on May 8, the day after Nazi Germany signed their articles of surrender.

This is an update of a post I did on the 70th Anniversary of V-J Day.

Every anniversary, the number of living World War II veterans becomes fewer and fewer. An 18-year-old kid who enlisted toward the end would now be 93 years old.

For this reason, we must keep the facts of what everyone who survived it, including on "the home front," would call "The War" for the rest of their lives, alive.

The Axis -- Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, and the Empire of Japan -- had to be defeated, dismantled, and replaced by governments more like America's than like what they had before.

If that meant allying with the British Empire, the French Empire, and the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, whose own leaders weren't exactly paragons of democracy, then so be it. The British and the French got better after The War; the Soviet Union did not.

When the U.S. Army began reaching the Nazis' concentration camps, which led to the deaths of 11 million people, 6 million of them Jews, General Dwight D. Eisenhower, later to become President of the United States, called for photographers and film crews to document what was found. He believed that, eventually, prominent people would deny that what became known as The Holocaust had occurred, and he wanted irrefutable proof that its horrors had happened. "Ike" turned out to be right.

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Some of the information in this post comes from the extensive site Baseball in Wartime, run by Gary Bedingfield.

All told, there were 1,343 men who both played in the major leagues and served in World War II. All but 5 of them served in the armed forces of the U.S. 1 major league player served in the Cuban Army: Pitcher Adrian Zabala. 4 were Canadian: Hank Biasatti and Dick Fowler in the Army, and Joe Krakauskas and Phil Marchildon of the Royal Canadian Air Force. Biasatti was a 1st baseman, the other Canadians were pitchers.

1 man served in the OSS, the Office of Strategic Services, the predecessor to the CIA: Moe Berg, the longtime backup catcher who spoke multiple languages -- a side effect when you grew up in Newark, New Jersey in the 1920s, and definitely a plus when you served your country in the 1930s and 1940s.

566 served in the U.S. Army, including Hall-of-Famers Luke Appling, Bobby Doerr, Warren Spahn, Red Schoendienst, Monte Irvin, Hoyt Wilhelm and (broadcasters' wing) Joe Garagiola.

466 served in the U.S. Navy, including HOFers Mickey Cochrane, Bill Dickey, Charlie Gehringer, Harold "Pee Wee" Reese, Phil Rizzuto, Stan Musial, Bob Lemon, and the 1 man involved in the D-Day invasion of June 6, 1944 who would go on to play in MLB: Lawrence Peter "Yogi" Berra, pictured above in his Navy uniform. A year later, Yogi "won his first world championship." And, by far, his most important one.

180 served in the U.S. Army Air Force -- which wouldn't be separated from the Army as the U.S. Air Force until after The War, in 1947 -- including HOFers Joe DiMaggio, Hank Greenberg and Enos Slaughter.

68 served in the U.S. Marine Corps, including HOFers Ted Williams and Ted Lyons, and should-be HOFer Gil Hodges. So did a pair of HOF broadcasters, Jack Brickhouse (not surprising, he seemed like a really gruff guy) and Ernie Harwell (very surprising, since he seemed like such a gentle soul).

At one point, Lyons pitched for a Marine team against a USAAF team, and DiMaggio was on it. Lyons said, "I enlisted to get away from DiMaggio, and, now, here he is!"

50 served in the U.S. Coast Guard, the most notable of them being Yankee star (hard to call him a "Yankee Legend" since he doesn't have a Plaque in Monument Park -- maybe he should, given his WWII service and his nickname of "Ol' Reliable") Tommy Henrich.

7 served in the U.S. Merchant Marine, including Yankee slugger Charlie Keller.

There were 2 major leaguers killed in The War. Neither was a star:

Elmer John Gedeon, born April 15, 1917 in Cleveland. He was an All-American in track and a letterwinner in baseball and football at the University of Michigan. He appeared in 5 major league games, all with the Washington Senators in September 1939, 4 as CF, 1 as RF. He wore Number 34. Had 3 hits in 15 at-bats, for a .200 batting average. He played for the Charlotte Hornets -- not the World Football League team, or either of the NBA franchises that have had the name, but a minor-league baseball team.

He was drafted into the Army in 1941, and was assigned to the Army Air Force. He crashed in a B-25 bomber training mission in 1942, but survived, and resumed pilot training. Captain Gedeon was shot down in a B-26 over St. Pol, France on April 20, 1944. He had just turned 27. There is no mention of him at Nationals Park in Washington. Nor was there at its predecessors, Robert F. Kennedy Stadium and Griffith Stadium.

Also wearing Number 34 for the Senators was Bert Shepard, a pitcher who lost a leg when his plane was shot down, but used a prosthesis, and pitched 1 game for the Senators in 1945, and continued to pitch in the minor leagues until 1954.

Harry Mink O'Neill, born May 8, 1917 in Philadelphia. He graduated from Gettysburg College, within walking distance of the site of the greatest battle of the American Civil War. At GC, he played baseball, football and basketball. He played 1 inning with the Philadelphia Athletics, also in 1939, on July 23, as a defensive replacement at catcher, wearing Number 30, and never came to bat -- making him a true "Moonlight Graham."

He enlisted in the Marine Corps in 1942. He survived being shot by a Japanese sniper at the Battle of Saipan. 1st Lieutenant O'Neill was killed in the Battle of Iwo Jima on March 6, 1945. He was not quite 28. There is no mention of him at Citizens Bank Park in Philadelphia. Nor was there at its predecessors, Veterans Stadium and Shibe Park/Connie Mack Stadium.

There is one other possibility: Charles Andrew Frye of Hickory, North Carolina was born in 1913, and pitched in 15 major league games, all with the 1940 Philadelphia Phillies. With a terrible team, he went 0-6 with a 4.65 ERA. He pitched 2 more seasons in the minors, enlisted, and was discharged on December 22, 1944 -- 8 months before V-J Day, and listed as 154 pounds, about 20 under his playing weight. But his weight and the timing together, and it's not proof of an illness contracted during his service, but does suggest it.

Charlie Frye died on May 25, 1945, in Hickory, of a ruptured gastric ulcer, 5 months after his discharge. So, officially, he isn't a former MLB player who died as a result of his military service in World War II. Unofficially, the evidence that he should be counted as one is, as he was upon his discharge, rather thin. Perhaps more information is needed.

By a macabre coincidence, the only major leaguer believed to have been killed in the Korean War was also born in 1917, and also appeared in the majors only briefly in 1939:

Bob Neighbors of Talihina, Oklahoma, the St. Louis Browns and the U.S. Air Force. He played 7 games at shortstop. (Strangely, there is no known record of what uniform number he wore. Baseball-Reference.com doesn't have one. Nor does Jack Looney's fantastic book Now Batting, Number... which charts baseball uniform numbers from the first-ever experiment with them in 1916 right up to 2005, just before the book's publication.)

He enlisted in 1942, and unlike most players, stayed in the service after the War, rising to the rank of Major. Like Gedeon, he flew a B-26. His plane was reported missing in 1952, and his body has never been found. There is no mention of him at the new Busch Stadium, nor was there at its predecessors, Busch Memorial Stadium and Sportsman's Park.

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Today, exactly 75 years after V-J Day, we are down to 16 men who are living veterans of both World War II and Major League Baseball: 

* Cloyd Boyer, born September 1, 1927, from Alba, Missouri. He pitched for his home-State St. Louis Cardinals 1949 to 1952. He returned to the majors with the first edition of the other Missouri team of the era, the 1955 Kansas City Athletics. He was the brother of All-Star 3rd basemen Ken and Clete (a Yankee star).

* Bobby Brown, born October 25, 1924 in Seattle, grew up in San Francisco. A 3rd baseman, he played for the Yankees from 1947 to 1954. He is the last surviving member of the Yankees' '47 and '49 title winners. He was Yogi's roommate at the time. He also won rings in '50 and '51. Then he returned to the service, in the Korean War.

He became a cardiologist, and served as President of the American League from 1984 to 1994. He should not be confused with the Bobby Brown who helped the Yankees win the 1981 Pennant, a black outfielder.

* Billy DeMars, born August 25, 1925, from Brooklyn. He was a shortstop, mostly with the Browns. He became a longtime coach, including the hitting instructor for the Phillies in their 1976-83 quasi-dynasty. He is 1 of 8 surviving former Browns. He is also 1 of 7 surviving former Philadelphia Athletics, and the last living man to have played for Connie Mack.

* Carl Erskine, born December 13, 1926, from Anderson, Indiana. A pitcher, he spent his entire career with the Dodgers, from 1948 in Brooklyn to 1959 in Los Angeles. He is the last surviving player featured in Roger Kahn's book about the 1952-53 Dodgers, The Boys of Summer.

* Johnny Groth, born July 23, 1926, from Chicago. A center fielder, mostly with the Tigers, he played in 157 games in 1950, a record until the 162-game schedule was instituted in 1961. (Players get credit for statistics in games that are called due to rainouts when tied.)

* Chris Haughey, born October 3, 1925, from Astoria, Queens. "Bud" Haughey's major league debut was on his 18th birthday, the last game of the 1943 season, as a pitcher for his hometown Dodgers. It was also his last major league game. Dodger legend Gil Hodges also made his big-league debut in this game.

* Howie Judson, born February 16, 1926, from Hebron, Illinois, outside Chicago. A pitcher, went 1-14 for the 1949 White Sox, and was unotherwise unremarkable.

* Ed Mickelson, born September 9, 1926, from Ottawa, Illinois, also outside Chicago. Despite getting 1,374 hits in minor league play, the 1st baseman's major league career was fleeting, with brief callups with the 1950 Cardinals, 1953 Browns and 1957 Cubs.

* Larry Miggins, born August 20, 1925, from The Bronx. An outfielder, he had end-of-season callups with the Cardinals in 1948 and 1952.

* Robert J. "Bob" Miller, born June 16, 1926, from Detroit. A pitcher, he went 42-42 over 10 season with the Phillies, including pitching in the 1950 World Series for the "Whiz Kids." He and Curt Simmons are the last 2 surviving players from that team. He later served as the head coach at the University of Detroit Mercy. His sons Pat and Bob also became baseball coaches.

He should not be confused with the 2 Bob Millers who not only both played for the 1962 Mets, but even roomed together, and, whenever the phone would ring, would answer, "Hello, Bob Miller here."

* Bobby Morgan, born June 29, 1926, from Oklahoma City. 3B, starred with the Montreal Royals, had a callup with the Dodgers in 1950, spent '51 back in Montreal, and filled in for Billy Cox with the Dodgers in '52 and '53, appearing in 3 World Series games. Also played with the Phils, Cards and Cubs until 1958.

* William Edward "Eddie" Robinson, born December 15, 1920, from Paris, Texas. A 1st baseman, he is the last surviving member of the last Cleveland Indians team to win the World Series, in 1948. A 4-time All-Star, he had 3 100+ RBI seasons, with the White Sox and A's.

He came to the Yankees in the infamous 1953 trade that sent Vic Power to the A's. He helped the Yankees win the 1955 Pennant, although he did not win a World Series with them. He closed his career with the 1957 Orioles.

He later served in the front offices of the Orioles, Houston Astros, A's, Atlanta Braves, Texas Rangers, including 5 seasons (1972-76) as Braves general manager and 5 (1978-82) as Rangers GM. He losed his active baseball career as a scout for the Red Sox, the only 1 of the original 8 AL teams for whom he didn't play. Currently the oldest living ex-MLB player, if he lives at least another 4 months and change, he will be 100 years old.

* Frank Saucier, born May 28, 1926, from Leslie, Missouri. An outfielder, he was The Sporting News' Minor League Player of the Year with the San Antonio Missions in 1950. He played 18 games with his hometown St. Louis Browns in 1951, going just 1-for-14.

He is best remembered for a game in which he barely played: On August 19, 1951, he began the game in right field, and was listed as the Browns' leadoff batter, but never came to bat. Instead, he was removed for a pinch-hitter, the 3-foot-7 midget Eddie Gaedel. His baseball opportunity apparently at an end, re-enlisted, serving in the Korean War.

* Bobby Shantz, born September 26, 1925, from Pottstown, Pennsylvania. Though listed at just 5-foot-6 and 139 pounds, he was the last of the many great pitchers brought to the Philadelphia Athletics by manager-owner Connie Mack. In 1952, he went 24-7 for an A's team that went 79-75. Despite the 4th place finish, he was named AL MVP.

He moved with the A's to Kansas City, and in 1957, he came to the Yankees in one of the many lopsided trades that led people to think that, as had been the case before the A's moved in, that Kansas City was still a "Yankee farm team." He went 11-5 and led the AL with a 2.45 ERA, helping the Yankees win the Pennant. He won a World Series ring in 1958, but did not appear in the Series. He pitched 3 Series games each in 1957 and 1960.

He was traded to the Pirates, then became an original Houston Colt .45 (Astro) in the 1962 expansion draft. He closed his career with another hometown team, the ill-fated 1964 Phillies, but their epic collapse was hardly his fault: In 14 games, 11 in relief, he had a 2.25 ERA at age 39.

A 3-time All-Star, his career record was 119-99. He won Gold Gloves the 1st 8 seasons they were given out, 1957 to 1964. In 2003, he was one of several surviving A's players invited to Veterans Stadium, as the Interleague schedule allows the A's to play their 1 game in Philadelphia since 1954. (I was there.) His brother Billy Shantz (1927-1993) was a teammate on both the A's and the Yankees.

* Willard Wayne Terwilliger (who went by his middle name), born June 27, 1925, from Clare, Michigan. 

A 2nd baseman, he debuted with the Cubs in 1949, and played for both the Dodgers and the Giants before they moved. He is 1 of only 4 surviving men on both rosters, combined, from the Bobby Thomson game on October 3, 1951. (The others are Dodgers Carl Erskine and Tommy Brown, and Giant Willie Mays.) He is 1 of 16 surviving former Brooklyn Dodgers, 1 of 14 surviving former New York Giants, and 1 of 27 surviving former "old" Washington Senators, the ones who moved to become the Minnesota Twins in 1960-61.

He closed out his career with the A's in 1960. He coached in the Yankees system, and was the 3rd base coach for the "new" Washington Senators when they moved to become the Texas Rangers in 1971-72. He coached on teams managed by Ted Williams and Don Zimmer in Texas, before winning rings as Tom Kelly's 3rd base coach with the 1987 and 1991 Twins. He returned to the Dallas area to coach the independent league Fort Worth Cats (named for the old Texas League team), and left them and retired from baseball for good after the 2010 season, at age 85.

* George Rezin Elder Jr., born March 10, 1921, from Lebanon, Kentucky. An outfielder, he played 41 games in the majors, all with the St. Louis Browns in the 2nd half of the 1949 season.

UPDATE: Howie Judson died on August 18, 2020. Bob Miller died on November 27, 2020. Billy DeMars died on December 10, 2020. Wayne Terwilliger died on February 3, 2021. Bobby Brown died on March 25, 2021. Johnny Groth died on August 7, 2021. Cloyd Boyer died on September 20, 2021. Eddie Robinson died on October 4, 2021. Chris Haughey died on April 24, 2022. George Elder died on July 7, 2022. Bobby Morgan died on June 1, 2023.

That leaves 5: Carl Erskine, Ed Mickelson, Larry Miggins, Frank Saucier and Bobby Shantz.

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With the death of Hall-of-Fame Red Sox 2nd baseman and Army veteran Bobby Doerr at age 99 on November 13, 2017, there were no more living men who played in MLB in the 1930s. With the death of A's pitcher and Army veteran Fred Caliguiri at 100 on November 30, 2018, there were no more living men who debuted in MLB before the Pearl Harbor naval base at Honolulu, Hawaii was bombed by the Japanese, bringing America into The War.

There are 4 remaining men who played in MLB during World War II:

* Eddie Robinson, 99, who debuted on September 9, 1942, and last played on September 15, 1957.
* Chris Haughey, 94, his only appearance coming on October 3, 1943.
* Eddie Basinski, 97, who did not serve, May 20, 1944 to July 4, 1947.
* Tommy "Buckshot" Brown, 91, who was too young to serve, August 3, 1944, and remains the 2nd-youngest MLB player ever, to September 25, 1953.

Basinski is the last surviving player who played in the "Tricornered Game" in which the Giants, Dodgers and Yankees all played against each other to sell war bonds at the Polo Grounds in 1944; and the last surviving player mentioned in Dave Frischberg's song "Van Lingle Mungo."

Brown remains the 2nd-youngest MLB player ever, behind Joe Nuxhall, who got shelled in 1 inning for the Cincinnati Reds in 1944, shortly before turning 16, returned to the majors from 1952 to 1965, mostly for the Reds, and became a broadcaster for them.

UPDATE: As I said, Robinson died on October 4, 2021. And Basinski died on January 8, 2022. That leaves 2: Haughey and Brown.

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The best baseball player killed in World War II was Eiji Sawamura. When an All-Star team of U.S. players toured Japan in the Autumn of 1934, he was 17, and pitched against them, striking out Charlie Gehringer, Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig and Jimmie Foxx, all in a row. But he lost the game 2-1 because he gave up a home run to Gehrig.

From 1936 to 1943, he pitched for the Tokyo Kyogin, the team that became known as the Yomiuri Giants, helping them win 4 Pennants, pitching 3 no-hitters, and winning the league's Most Valuable Player award in 1937.

On December 2, 1944, he was 1 of 2,134 men killed when the Hawaii Maru, a ship named for Japan's victory at Pearl Harbor ("maru" is Japanese for "ship"), was sunk by the submarine USS Sea Devil off the coast of Yakushima Island in the East China Sea.

The Yomiuri Giants retired his Number 14. In 1947, the Sawamura Award for Japan's best pitcher was established, 9 years before America had its equivalent, the Cy Young Award. He was a charter inductee into the Japanese Baseball Hall of Fame in 1959.

There appear to have been 20 former NFL players killed in World War II. Two of them played for the New York Giants, Al Blozis and Jack Lummus. Plaques in their memory were placed on the center field clubhouse at the Polo Grounds, and both have been honored in the Giants' Ring of Honor. Blozis' Number 32 has been retired.

Al Blozis

(Lummus' plaque was found in 2005, and the football Giants bought it and put it on display. The whereabouts of the other Polo Grounds plaques are unknown.) 

The best football player killed in World War II never played a down of professional ball. Nile Kinnick, winner of the 1939 Heisman Trophy as a two-way back at the University of Iowa, turned down a contract from the NFL version of the Brooklyn Dodgers, who had drafted him.

Instead, he enrolled in law school, since he was considering a career in politics. There are still living Republicans in Iowa who believe that, had he lived, he would have beaten John F. Kennedy in the 1960 Presidential election. Of course, that presumes that he would have beaten Richard Nixon, either for the Republican nomination for President that year, or for the Vice Presidential nomination under Dwight D. Eisenhower in 1952.

Kinnick left law school to enlist in the Navy -- 3 days before the attack on Pearl Harbor -- and was killed during a flight training accident off the coast of Venezuela on June 2, 1943. The University of Iowa retired his Number 24, and, in 1972, renamed Iowa Stadium for him: Kinnick Stadium.

There were 2 former NHL players killed in World War II: Joe Turner, a goaltender who played only 1 game, for the Detroit Red Wings against the Toronto Maple Leafs on February 5, 1942. Despite being Canadian, he enlisted in the U.S. Army. On December 13, 1944, he was lost in action with in the Hurtgen Forest of Germany.

And Dudley "Red" Garrett was a defenseman who played 23 games for the New York Rangers in the 1942-43 season. He was serving aboard the HMCS Shawinigan when it was sunk by the Nazi submarine U-1228 in Cabot Strait, off the coast of Newfoundland, on November 25, 1944. He was only 20.

The NBA wasn't founded until 1946, so none of its former players were killed in World War II. Nor have any been killed in any war. Nor can I find a reference to any prominent college player, who hadn't yet gotten to play in a pro league, who was killed in World War II.

There have been so many soccer teams, all over the world and especially in Europe, that a definitive list of players fitting any category is difficult. Given what happened to records in Germany, Italy, and the Soviet Union, we may never know how many "footballers" from those countries were lost in action in World War II.

There appear to have been at least 73 British players who were killed as a result of their military service in that war, 5 of them Scottish, the rest English. The best of them may have been Herbie Roberts, a centreback for North London team Arsenal, who helped them win the Football League in 1931, '33, '34 and '35, and the FA Cup in 1930 and '36, before dying of a blood disease, not in combat, on June 19, 1944, at 39. He was 1 of 9 players who had played for Arsenal who were lost.

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The East Brunswick Veterans' Memorial, at the Civic Center off Ryders Lane, has a memorial dating to 1949, to 12 natives of the Township who were killed in action in World War II: Adam Albrecht, Edward Biernacki, Casper Fetyko, Milton Finkelstein, Constantine Haransky, Henry Jensen, Lawrence Kossman, William Kossman, Joseph Mihalichko, Edward Modzelewski, Alex Volgyi and Alfred Wolff.

The Kossmans were brothers. Lawrence was killed in the Philippines on December 30, 1944. William, and also Haranski and Jensen, were killed on February 10, 1944, in the Battle of Anzio in Italy. Albrecht was killed in Italy 7 days later, and while I do not have further detail, it seems likely that his death was also during the Anzio campaign.

Albrecht, Biernacki, Fetyko, Jensen, the Kossmans, Mihalichko, Modzelewski and Wolff have streets named after them in the Township. So does Michael Lonczak, killed in action in Germany, but whose name, for a reason I don't know, does not appear on the memorial. Also with streets named for them are the 4 we lost in Vietnam, and the 1 each we lost in Afghanistan and Iraq. We lost 1 in the Civil War and 4 in World War I, but none of them has a street named for him.

Of the 4 we lost in World War I, 3 were actually stateside, in the Spanish Flu epidemic that ended up killing twice as many people as the war. Joseph Crandall died in combat, and had a school named after him, just 2 blocks from the town's WWI memorial, at the American Legion Post.

Top 10 Athletes From Iowa

December 28, 1846: Iowa is admitted to the Union as the 29th State.

Top 10 Athletes From Iowa

Dishonorable Mention to Adrian Constantine "Cap" Anson of Marshalltown. In 27 seasons of professional baseball, the 1st baseman had a .334 lifetime batting average, and was the 1st man to have over 3,000 hits, and the 1st to have over 2,000 runs batted in. He led the National League in batting twice and in RBIs 8 times.

As a manager, he led the Chicago White Stockings (forerunners of the Cubs) to Pennants in 1880, 1881, 1882, 1885 and 1886. He was still a regular player in 1897, at the age of 45. And, before the 1886 season, he took his players down to Hot Springs, Arkansas to "boil the beer out of them." Thus did Cap Anson invent Spring Training. He was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1939, in one of its earliest classes.

So, why "Dishonorable"? Because he is widely believed to be the reason that black men were excluded from professional baseball from 1888 to 1945. In 1883, he refused to play an exhibition game in Toledo in which a black player, Moses Walker, was in the lineup for the local team. He was told that this would result in his forfeiting the game and his team's (and thus his) share of the gate receipts, and he backed down. In 1887, he refused to allow George Stovey to play for Newark against his White Stockings in an exhibition game in Newark, and Stovey did not play.

Shortly thereafter, black players "disappeared" from professional baseball, in what became known as the "gentlemen's agreement." It stood long past Anson's 1897 retirement and his 1922 death, until Branch Rickey signed Jackie Robinson in 1945 and promoted him to the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947.

How responsible for this was Anson? He was the biggest star in the game. If White Stockings owner Al Spalding was, in effect, the commissioner of baseball, then Anson was Michael Jordan to Spalding's David Stern: Whatever Anson wanted, Spalding approved, and Spalding's word was law. But Spalding never gets the blame for this, because he was never heard saying, "Get that (N-word) off the field!" Anson was.

It can, of course, be argued that the color line would have been drawn even without Anson's objection. But, more than anyone else in the story of what actually happened, he is to blame.

Honorable Mention to Shawn Johnson of West Des Moines. In 2008, she won the Gold Medal in the balance beam at the Olympics in Beijing, and received the James M. Sullivan Award as America's outstanding amateur athlete.

10. Dave Bancroft of Sioux City. "Beauty" was the rookie shortstop on the Philadelphia Phillies team that won the 1915 National League Pennant. He also won Pennants with the New York Giants in 1921, 1922 and 1923, winning the World Series in 1921 and 1922. That said, he is often considered one of the less-deserving members of the Baseball Hall of Fame. He is one of the "Frisch Five," elected by the Veterans Committee on the say-so of his former Giant double-play partner, Frankie Frisch, a member of that committee. Nevertheless, he is in the Hall.

9. Jay Berwanger of Dubuque. The University of Chicago dropped big-time sports only a few years after his 1935 season there, in which he was named the 1st winner of what would later be renamed the Heisman Trophy. He was also a decathlete on their track team.

The 1st NFL Draft was held in 1936, and he was the 1st player, selected, by the Philadelphia Eagles. He wanted $1,000 per game -- which, with inflation factored in, would be about $286,000 for an annual salary. That doesn't sound like much by today's standards, does it? But it was the Great Depression, and the Eagles weren't exactly swimming in cash.

They traded his rights to the Chicago Bears. He didn't sign, because he thought he had a chance to be the U.S.' representative in the decathlon at the 1936 Olympics. But he didn't make it. He asked Bears owner-coach George Halas for $15,000 for the season (about $266,000), and Halas -- famously cheap, later described by Mike Ditka as a man who "throws nickels around like manhole covers" -- offered $13,500 (about $239,000). Berwanger turned it down, took a job with a rubber company, and another as an assistant coach at his alma mater. He later said he should have taken Halas' offer.

Without him, the Bears reached 6 of the next 11 NFL Championship Games, winning 4. Without them, Berwanger lived a long and professionally successful life, but was rarely in the spotlight, always coming back into it in December as another Heisman was awarded. He was elected to both the Iowa and the Chicagoland Sports Halls of Fame.

8. Elmer Layden of Davenport. A fullback, he was one of the "Four Horsemen of Notre Dame," helping the Fighting Irish win the 1924 National Championship. His pro career wasn't much, playing in 1925 for the Hartford Blues and in 1926 for the Rock Island Independents and, along with his college teammate Harry Stuhldreher (but not the other 2, Jim Crowley and Don Miller), for a team named for them, the Brooklyn Horsemen.

He later coached at Duquesne University in Pittsburgh and at Notre Dame, with a career record of 103-34-11. He also served as Notre Dame's athletic director, and was Commissioner of the NFL from 1941 to 1946. He was elected to the College Football Hall of Fame.

7. Nile Kinnick of Adel. Born in the same State in the same year as Bob Feller, he could have become an even bigger star. He won the Heisman Trophy at the University of Iowa in 1939, and won the Associated Press' Male Athlete of the Year. He went to law school rather than play in the NFL, and there was talk that he would be Governor of Iowa and eventually President of the United States.

World War II prevented that. On June 2, 1943, Ensign Nile Kinnick was unable to land his Grumman F4F Wildcat on the deck of the aircraft carrier USS Lexington, and crashed off the coast of Venezuela. His body was never recovered. He was only 24, matching his Iowa uniform number, which was retired. Of the 82 men who have been awarded the Heisman, he is the only one to die in military service, and only Ernie Davis (1961, Syracuse University) had a shorter life.

In 1972, Iowa Stadium was renamed Kinnick Stadium. He was posthumously elected to the College Football Hall of Fame in 1951, in the same class as Layden.

6. Urban "Red" Faber of Cascade. A member of the 1917 World Champion Chicago White Sox, he was also with them in 1919 when 8 of their players were accused of throwing the World Series, but, as far as anybody knows, he was clean. In spite of the team having been broken up in the resulting Black Sox Scandal, he led the American League in earned run average in 1921 and 1922, and finished his career with a record of 254-213. He lived long enough to see himself elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame.

5. Fred Clarke of Des Moines. A left fielder, he starred for the Louisville Colonels and then, after they were consolidated with the Pittsburgh Pirates after the 1899 season, for the Pirates. From 1897 to 1915, he was a player-manager, but still managed to bat .312, collecting 2,678 hits and 506 stole bases. He managed the Pirates to National League Pennants in 1901, 1902, 1903 and 1909, losing the 1st World Series in 1903, but winning it in 1909. He lived long enough to be elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame.

4. Kurt Warner of Cedar Rapids. One of football's biggest "rags to riches" tales, the former University of Northern Iowa quarterback had washed out with the Green Bay Packers in 1994, and was playing arena football in his home State and worked in a supermarket when the St. Louis Rams offered him a lifeline in 1998.

An injury to Trent Green in the 1999 preseason was Warner's chance, and he led the Rams all the way to victory in Super Bowl XXXIV -- the 1st NFL Championship in St. Louis history, and the 1st for the Rams franchise in 48 years. He was named Most Valuable Player of that game, and would be named NFL MVP in 1999 and 2001.

A 4-time Pro Bowler, he would get the Rams into Super Bowl XXXVI, but they lost. He would later be signed by the Arizona Cardinals, and get them into Super Bowl XLIII, their 1st NFC Championship, and their 1st NFL Championship Game under any name in 60 years. But they lost, too.

He was elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame earlier this year. He was elected to the St. Louis Football Ring of Fame and the Arizona Cardinals Ring of Honor. If the Rams institute a new team hall of fame once their permanent Los Angeles (Inglewood) stadium opens, he might be named to it, even though he never played a professional game in the L.A. metropolitan area.

3. Roger Craig of Davenport. Not to be confused with the 1950s and '60s baseball pitcher of the same name, this Roger Craig starred in both football and track at the University of Nebraska. A 4-time Pro Bowler, he helped the San Francisco 49ers win Super Bowls XIX, XXIII and XXIV. In 1985, he became the 1st running back with 1,000 yards in both rushing and receiving. He was named NFL Offensive Player of the Year in 1988.

He rushed for 8,189 yards, and also caught 566 passes for 4,911 yards, totaling 73 touchdowns. He has been named to the NFL's 1980s All-Decade Team, the 49ers Hall of Fame, and the Bay Area Sports Hall of Fame -- but, for some strange reason, not yet the Pro Football Hall of Fame. This makes no sense: Despite the State having produced a Super Bowl-winning quarterback, 2 Heisman Trophy winners, and one of Notre Dame's Four Horsemen, he is the most accomplished football player from Iowa.

2. Dan Gable of Waterloo. He is the greatest wrestler who ever lived, and the greatest wrestling coach who ever lived, and you can take all your WWE stars and stick them where the Sun don't shine.

At Waterloo West High School, his career record as a wrestler was 64-0, winning 3 State Championships. He was also a State Champion swimmer, their quarterback, and a baseball player. At Iowa State University, he went 181-1, winning 2 National Championships, losing only in the NCAA Final in his senior year. In other words, he won 225 amateur wrestling matches before he was finally beaten.

The Soviet Union athletic machine, rightly proud of their wrestling achievements, vowed to "scour the Eastern Bloc to find a wrestler who could take down Dan Gable." They were unsuccessful: Despite an injured knee and stitches in his head after an injury in his 1st match, he won the Gold Medal in the 150-pound weight class at the 1972 Olympics in Munich, without surrendering a single point in any match.

If I were counting his coaching achievements, he would easily be Number 1. Despite having been an Iowa State graduate, he went to their arch-rivals, the University of Iowa, in 1976. He won 9 straight National Championships from 1978 to 1986, finally being dethroned in 1987 by... Iowa State.

He coached until 1997, with a dual meet record of 355-21-5, 16 team National Championships, 152 All-Americans, 45 individual National Champions, and 4 Olympic Gold Medalists. He also coached the U.S. Olympic team in 1980 (boycotted), 1984 and 2000. He also, literally, wrote the book on coaching the sport: Coaching Wrestling Successfully, published in 1999. Of course, he is in the National Wrestling Hall of Fame. He should be: He is both the Babe Ruth and the Casey Stengel of his sport.

1. Bob Feller of Van Meter. He had one of the best curveballs ever, but his stock in trade was the fastball, a.k.a. the heater. So he was known as Bullet Bob, Rapid Robert, and the Heater From Van Meter. And he might have been the best pitcher of his generation.

And he beat his generation to the major leagues. In their 1981 book The 100 Greatest Baseball Players of All Time, Lawrence Ritter and Donald Honig (one of them, anyway, but it's hard to tell which) wrote, "Bob Feller remains baseball's only prodigy." He debuted for the Cleveland Indians in 1936, while still in high school. To give you an idea: Joe DiMaggio also debuted in 1936, but he was 4 years older; Ted Williams was also born in 1918, but debuted 3 years later.

He set an American League record, striking out 17 batters in a game -- when 17 was also his age. In 1938, still not quite 19, he raised that record to 18. In 1940, he pitched a no-hitter, still the only one ever pitched on a season's Opening Day. he won the pitching Triple Crown that season, including 27 wins, a total only 1 American League pitcher has topped since (Denny McLain's 31 in 1968).

At the close of the 1941 season, just before turning 23, he was 107-54. For the sake of comparison: Warren Spahn, also decorated for heroism in World War II, wouldn't win his 1st major league game until he got back -- at age 25.

Feller missed the entire seasons of 1942, 1943 and 1944, and most of 1945 -- at the ages of 23, 24, 25 and 26 -- serving in the U.S. Navy, into which he was sworn by former Heavyweight Champion, Commander Gene Tunney. He served as a gunner on the battleship USS Alabama, and rose to the rank of Chief Petty Officer.

"Hooyah!"

He said he didn't care what statistics or achievements he lost due to his wartime service, because The War was more important. He also had some words of wisdom for people who compare sports and war: "Anybody who says sports is war has never been in a war."

In 1946, his 1st full season back, he pitched a no-hitter against the Yankees, and struck out 348 batters. This was long believed to be a major league record, but a later check revealed that Rube Waddell, had 349 strikeouts in 1904, not 343 as previously believed. It was still the highest total between 1904 and 1965. In 1948, he finally won an AL Pennant and a World Series with the Indians. In 1951, he pitched a 3rd no-hitter, tying what was then the record.

He was an 8-time All-Star. There was no Cy Young Award in his era, but if there was, he probably would have won it 5 and possibly 7 times. As it is, he finished in the top 3 in the AL MVP voting 3 times. He won another Pennant in 1954, but all those early innings finally wore him down, and he retired after the 1956 season.

His final record was 266-162, with 2,581 strikeouts. Had he been exempted from service, and not gotten hurt in the meantime, he might have won over 350 games, and seriously challenged the career record for strikeouts at the time, Walter Johnson's 3,508.

He was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in his 1st year of eligibility. In 1999, The Sporting News ranked him 36th on their 100 Greatest Baseball Players. The Indians retired his Number 19, and he lived long enough to see a statue of himself dedicated outside their current ballpark, what's now named Progressive Field. There is a Bob Feller Museum in Van Meter, whose architect was his son Stephen Feller.

How to Go to a Football Game In Iowa

The State House in Des Moines

37 States down, 13 to go. This coming Saturday, the football teams of the University of Iowa and Iowa State University play each other, at Iowa State in Ames.

Iowa opened its season yesterday by beating Wyoming 24-3, while Iowa State opened with a 42-24 win over Northern Iowa.

There is, of course, the chance that Rutgers and Iowa will face each other in the Big Ten Conference Championship Game. But who's kidding who? Rutgers will be lucky to win a single Conference game. That's why I'm doing the Iowa post now, as the 2 biggest sports teams in the State play each other this weekend.

Before You Go. Iowa weather is typical of the Midwest: Extremes of heat in the Summer, and of cold in the Winter. Being on the prairie, wind could be a problem, especially in cold weather.

If you're interested in going to this weekend's game, in Ames, the weather for the entire weekend is expected to be in the mid-70s in daylight, and the high 50s at night.

Iowa is in the Central Time Zone, 1 hour behind New York. Adjust your timepieces accordingly.

Tickets. For this game, you're probably out of luck, unless you can get something on a resale site. As for other games: Kinnick Stadium seats 70,585, and the Hawkeyes usually fill it or come close to it; while Trice Stadium seats 61,500, but usually tops out at around 50,000 for games other than UI-ISU.

At Iowa, throughout the stadium, both sidelines and ends, tickets are $45 close to the field, $25 further from it. At Iowa State, all tickets are $30.

Getting There. It's an even 1,000 miles from Times Square in Midtown Manhattan to Iowa City, and, for future reference for Rutgers games, 998 miles from High Point Solutions Stadium in Piscataway, New Jersey to Kinnick Stadium in Iowa City. From Times Sqaure to Jack Trice Stadium in Ames, it's 1,125 miles.

Driving from New York (or New Jersey) to Iowa City is fairly simple: Just take Interstate 80 West, crossing New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana and Illinois. I-80 bypasses Chicago, although the temptation to make a rest stop there would be understandable.

If you do it right, you should spend about an hour and a half in New Jersey, 5 hours and 15 minutes in Pennsylvania, 4 hours in Ohio, 2 hours and 30 minutes in Indiana, 2 hours and 45 minutes in Illinois, and 45 minutes in Iowa. That's 17 hours, and, with rest stops, probably around 24 hours.

To Ames, take Interstate 380 North when you get to Iowa City, then at Cedar Rapids, head West on U.S. Route 30. That's another 2 hours and 30 minutes, which means probably another rest stop, so we're talking about 27 hours total.

Amtrak does not go to Iowa City. Nor does it go to Ames. And unless you can get one of those El Cheapo Airlines commuter services, you're better off flying into Chicago (or maybe Des Moines) and renting a car than flying into Iowa City Municipal Airport or Ames Municipal Airport.

Incredibly, Greyhound (at the least, Greyhound after flying into Chicago) may be your best bet. New York to Iowa City, round-trip, is $424, but it can drop to $324 with advanced purchase.

Once In the City. The State of Iowa, admitted to the Union as the 29th State on December 28, 1846, was named for the Ioway tribe of Native Americans, and is home to 3.1 million people. Iowa City was founded in 1839, to move the State Capitol out of Burlington, on the Mississippi River, and closer to the center of the State. But in 1857, the Capitol was moved to Des Moines. The University, founded in 1847, a year after Statehood, remains. In addition to this main campus, the University maintains The Oakdale Campus, in nearby Coralville.

The State sales tax is 6 percent. Leading newspapers include the Des Moines Register, The Gazette of Cedar Rapids, the Quad-City Times of Davenport, the Sioux City Journal, the Iowa City Press-Citizen, and the Ames Tribune. ZIP Codes in Iowa start with the digits 50, 51 and 52; for Iowa City, 52240; and for Ames, 50011. The Area Codes are 319 for Iowa City, and 515 for Ames.

Iowa City is centered on the Old Capitol Museum, with Iowa Avenue dividing streets into North and South, and Capitol Street dividing them into East and West. In Ames, Duff Avenue divides into East and West, and Lincoln Way into North and South. Neither Iowa City nor Ames has a freeway "beltway."

Iowa City is home to 75,000 permanent residents, not counting university students. Notable Hawkeye athletes in sports other than football include:

* Baseball: Al Reinhart, Wes Obermueller, Jim Sundberg and Cal Eldred. Also, broadcaster Milo Hamilton.

* Baskeball: Chuck Darling (1956 Olympic Gold Medalist), Don Nelson (also a legendary coach), "Downtown" Freddie Brown, his 1979 NBA Champion Seattle SuperSonics teammate John Johnson, Brad Lohaus, B.J. Armstrong, Acie Earl.

* Olympic Gold Medalists: George Saling, hurdling, 1932; Wally Ris, swimming, 1948; twin brothers Ed and Lou Banach, Randall Lewis, wrestling, 1984; Tom Brands, wrestling, 1996; Anthuan Maybank, sprinting, 1996.

Iowa graduates in other fields include:

* Business: Paul P. Harris, founder of the Rotary Club International.

* Politics, representing Iowa unless otherwise stated: Governors Leo Hoegh, John Burke (North Dakota), Kay Orr (Nebraska), Terry Branstad; Senator Norm Coleman of Minnesota; and House Majority Whip David Bonior of Michigan. Also, pollster George Gallup.

* Literature: Mildred Benson, a.k.a. Nancy Drew creator Carolyn Keene; Wallace Stegner, Josephine Johnson, Flannery O'Connor, Tennessee Williams, John Irving, James Alan McPherson, W.P. Kinsella, Michael Cunningham, Joe Haldeman, T. Coraghessan Boyle, Rita Dove, Jane Smiley, Tracy Kidder, David Drake, Marilynne Robinson, Andre Dubus, Robert Hass, and Charles Gaines, who not only wrote Pumping Iron, but invented paintball.

* Journalism: Marquis Childs, Paul Conrad, Tom Brokaw.

* Entertainment: Actors Macdonald Carey, Jean Seberg, Greg Morris, Lara Parker, Gene Wilder, Tom Arnold, Terry O'Quinn, Ashton Kutcher and Brandon Routh; TV producer Barry Kemp; director Nicholas Meyer; screenwriter Diablo Cody; singer Al Jarreau; and saxophonist David Sanborn.

* Science: James Van Allen.

Ames was founded in 1864, as a station stop on the Cedar Rapids and Missouri Railroad, and was named for Congressman Oakes Ames of Massachusetts, who was instrumental in the building of the transcontinental railroad. The city is home to 59,000 people.

Iowa Agricultural College and Model Farm was founded in 1858, and became Iowa State College of Agriculture and Mechanic Arts in 1898, and Iowa State University in 1959. Oddly, unlike a lot of "Agricultural and Mechanical" schools, including those that became "(State Name) State University," they were never known as "A&M," nor their teams as "the Aggies."

Notable Iowa State athletes, outside of football, include:

* Baseball: Jim Walewander and Mike Myers.

* Basketball: Jeff Hornaceck, Kelvin Cato, Jamaal Tinsley.

* Olympic Gold Medalists, all in wrestling: Glen Brand, 1948; Dan Gable and Ben Peterson, 1972; Kevin Jackson, 1992; Cael Sanderson, 2004; and Jake Varner, 2012.

In other fields:

* Politics: Henry C. Wallace, Secretary of Agriculture under Warren Harding and Calvin Coolidge; his son, Henry A. Wallace, Secretary of Agriculture and then Vice President under Franklin Roosevelt; Ezra Taft Benson, Mormon leader and Secretary of Agriculture under Dwight D. Eisenhower; Lauro Cavazos, Secretary of Education under Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush; Governors John Edward Jones (Nevada), Bourke Hickelooper, Garry Carruthers (New Mexico) and Kim Reynolds; Senators Tom Harkin and Joni Ernst; and Lee Teng-hui, former President of Taiwan. Also, League of Women Voters founder Carrie Chapman Catt.

* Journalism: Hugh Sidey, Robert Bartley, Terry Anderson, Sally Jacobsen.

* Science: George Washington Carver, homogenized milk developer G. Malcolm Trout; computer pioneers John Atanasoff, Clifford Berry, Bob O. Evans and John Gustafson.

Going In. Iowa Stadium opened in 1929, and was renamed Kinnick Stadium for the school's greatest football legend in 1972. This makes it the only college football stadium named for a Heisman Trophy winner.

Typical of the Big Ten stadiums that went up in the 1910s and 1920s -- Ohio Stadium, Michigan Stadium, Ross-Ade Stadium at Purdue, Camp Randall Stadium at Wisconsin, Ryan Field at Northwestern, and the Memorial Stadiums of Illinois, Minnesota (now demolished), Indiana (now demolished) and Nebraska (not in the Big Ten until recently), is has a dark brick exterior with arches and columns.

It is at Melrose Avenue and Hawkins Drive. The official address is 825 Stadium Drive, about a mile across the Iowa River from downtown Iowa City. Campus bus service is provided from downtown.

The field runs north-to-south, and was switched to AstroTurf in 1972, back to real grass in 1989, and to FieldTurf in 2009. And watch your step on the sideline stands: They're pretty steep.

Kinnick Stadium is known for its visitors' locker room. Believing that the color pink would put opponents in a "passive mood," coach Hayden Fry had it painted that color in the 1980s.

TV producer Barry Kemp is a University of Iowa graduate, and so he did some filming at the school to establish location shots for the fictional Minnesota State University for his TV show Coach. This included the Iowa Memorial Union (the student union and a hotel, at 125 N. Madison Street, which stood in as the building housing the coaches' offices and locker rooms) and Kinnick Stadium.

He also named the main character, played by Craig T. Nelson, "Hayden Fox," after then-Iowa coach Hayden Fry. He also made Iowa's main rival, the University of Minnesota, Minnesota State's arch-rival, especially after UM wouldn't let ABC film on campus.

(Kemp also wrote the episode of Newhart that introduced this line, and the characters thereof: "Hi, I'm Larry, this is my brother Darrell, and this is my other brother Darrell.")

Iowa State opened Cyclone Stadium in 1975, renaming it Jack Trice Stadium in 1997. This makes it the only college football stadium, other than those at "historically black" schools, named for an African-American. "The Jack" is at 1798 S. 4th Street, about a mile southwest of downtown Ames. Bus 3.

The field runs north-to-south, and, unlike most stadiums built prior to 1970, it started out with artificial turf and switched to real grass, in 1996. (UPDATE: It has been renamed Duke Slater Field, for Frederick Wayman Slater, a two-way tackle who was an All-American at Iowa in 1921, and then became one of the earliest black players in the NFL, before the color line was drawn in the early 1930s, playing for the Milwaukee Badgers, the Rock Island Independents and the Chicago Cardinals. He was a charter inductee into the College Football Hall of Fame in 1951, and in 2020, he was finally elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame.)

Hilton Coliseum, their arena, is directly north of the stadium, across a parking lot. Elvis Presley sang there on May 28, 1976.

Food. If you're going to a college football game in Iowa, the main reason to drive is to tailgate. This is, after all, Big Ten Country -- even if the Cyclones are in the Big XII. But if you're looking for inside the stadium, the Hawkeyes provide a decent selection, serving footlong hot dogs ($5.50, $7.50 if you add chili and cheese), and a pork tenderloin sandwich ($6.50). A souvenir-size popcorn costs $12, but you get a free refill.

The Cyclones may have better options. If you come no later than 30 minutes before kickoff, you can go to the Victory Bell concessions stands, behind Section A at the northwest corner and Section R at the northeast corner, you can get the Early Bird Bucket: 2 hot dogs, roasted peanuts, and a regular size soft drink, for $12.

They have Pizza Hut stands behind Sections, A, F and Q; Panera Bread at A, D, G, J, K, N, P and R (including each corner); and Johnsonville sausage stands at J and K (the southwest and southeast corners).

Team History Displays. The Football Writers Association awarded the 1958 National Championship to Iowa, coached by Forest Evashevski (for whom the street around the stadium is named), and quarterbacked by Randy Duncan. The Associated Press (AP, sportswriters) and United Press International (UPI, coaches) both awarded their National Championships to Louisiana State, and ranked Iowa Number 2.

Iowa has won 13 Conference Championship: 1896, 1900, 1907, 1921, 1922, 1956, 1958, 1960, 1981, 1985, 1990, 2002 and 2004. They won the Big Ten Conference Western Division in 2015, but lost the Championship Game to Michigan State. Kinnick Stadium has a Championship Plaza displaying these titles.

They've appeared in 30 bowl games, going 14-15-1, but have lost their last 5, including last season's Outback Bowl. Their last bowl win was the 2010 Insight Bowl. They've won the Rose Bowl in 1957 and 1959, and lost it in 1982, 1986 and 1991. Their only other major bowl has been the 2003 Orange Bowl, which they lost.

They've retired 2 numbers, and neither of the players they've honored played a single down in the NFL. Nile Kinnick, Number 24, was a halfback, and the winner of the school's only Heisman Trophy, in 1939. (Randy Duncan finished 2nd to Pete Dawkins of Army in 1958, and Chuck Long did so to Bo Jackson of Auburn in 1985.)

Kinnick was no "dumb jock": He had a 3.4 grade-point average, was elected Student Body President and to Phi Beta Kappa, and his Heisman acceptance speech was hailed as a masterwork. Whitney Martin of AP said he was "typifying everything admirable in American youth."

Including turning down big money to stay in school: The NFL version of the Brooklyn Dodgers drafted him, and offered him $10,000 for the 1940 season (about $176,000 in today's money), he, like 1935 All-America center Gerald Ford of Michigan, turned the NFL down to go to law school. (Didn't stop their contemporary Byron "Whizzer" White from doing both.)

He left law school and enlisted in the U.S. Navy -- 3 days before the attack on Pearl Harbor. He trained as a pilot, and, on June 2, 1943, his plane developed an oil leak, leaving him unable to return to the deck of the aircraft carrier USS Lexington off the coast of Venezuela. He crashed into the Gulf of Paria, and his body was never found. He was not quite 25 years old, and there would not be another Heisman winner to die until Ernie Davis was felled by leukemia 20 years later.

They've also honored Number 62, guard Cal Jones, who in 1955 was named the 1st black player to win the Outland Trophy as "the nation's outstanding interior lineman." He was also the 1st black person featured on the cover of Sports Illustrated, in 1954.

Neither ever played in the NFL. Jones was drafted by the Detroit Lions, but went instead to the Winnipeg Blue Bombers of the Canadian Football League, which, unlike the NFL, paid black players the same as white ones. At the end of his 1st season, on December 9, 1956, having played in the CFL All-Star Game, he and 4 Saskatchewan Roughriders players were among those killed in a plane crash outside Vancouver. Iowa then dedicated their upcoming 1st Rose Bowl appearance to his memory, and they beat Oregon State.

His grandson, Edwin Harrison, played at the University of Colorado and for the CFL's Calgary Stampeders. He also played guard and wore Number 62.

Other Iowa football notables include 1920s tackle Duke Slater (one of the 1st major black football stars), 1940s safety Emlen Tunnell (a Hall-of-Famer for the Giants), 1950s defensive tackle Alex Karras (the future Lions star, sportscaster and actor joking, "I was only at Iowa for 2 terms: Truman's 2nd and Eisenhower's 1st), the aforementioned Heisman runners-up Duncan and Long, 1960s safety Paul Krause, 1960s running back Ed Podolak, 1980s defensive linemen Andre Tippett and Mark Bortz, 1980s running back Ronnie Harmon, 1980s linebacker Larry Station, and 2000s tight end Dallas Clark.

UPDATE: Not only has the field at Kinnick Stadium been named for Slater, but a sculpture replicating a famous photograph of him has been built into the outside wall.

Iowa State's football history is considerably less storied. They've won only 2 Conference Championships, in 1911 and 1912, in the Missouri Valley Intercollegiate Athletic Association, the league that would eventually become the Big Six, the Big Seven, the Big Eight, and the bulk of their current league, the Big Twelve. They shared the Big 12 North Division with Colorado in 2004, but because Colorado had a higher national ranking, they went to the Conference Championship Game (and lost to Oklahoma).

They have just 2 players in the College Football Hall of Fame: 1930s guard Ed Bock, who, like Kinnick, chose to not to play pro ball, and, in his case, it worked out, as he rose to become CEO of Monsanto; and running back Troy Davis, who in 1996 finished 2nd in the Heisman balloting to Danny Wuerffel of Florida, and played for the New Orleans Saints and, like Cal Jones, in the CFL.

They are 3-9 in bowl games, having not appeared in one until the 1971 Sun Bowl, and not winning one unil the 2000 Insight.com Bowl. They also won the 2004 Independence Bowl and the 2009 Insight Bowl. They came to New York for the 2011 Pinstripe Bowl, and lost to Rutgers. Their last bowl appearance was the 2012 Liberty Bowl, which they lost to Tulsa.

The stadium's namesake is Jack Trice, ISU's 1st black varsity athlete. On October 6, 1923, Iowa State played Minnesota in Minneapolis. Despite Minnesota having been a Union State in the Civil War (only 58 years earlier), and being about as Northern as you can get and still be in the U.S., he had to stay in a different hotel than his teammates.

Early in the game, he took a hit, and his chest hurt. He insisted he could continue, and was sent back in. Later, he made a tackle, and in the process was stepped on by 3 Minnesota players. He still claimed to be fine, but this time, he was sent to a hospital. The doctors diagnosed the initial injury as a broken collarbone, discharged him, and declared him fit to travel. They reached Ames the next day, but the day after, internal bleeding killed him. He was only 21.

Plaque at the stadium

There was speculation that the Minnesota players may have targeted him. Was it because he was black? Was it because he was already injured? Was it simply untrue? Whatever the truth was, Iowa State did not renew its contract to play Minnesota, and didn't play them again until 1989.

Despite having named their stadium after him, Iowa State has not retired his Number 37, nor that of any other player. Mackenro Alexander, a senior defensive back, wears 37 for them this season.

Statues of Kinnick and Trice stand outside their respective stadiums, each at the north end, showing him wearing street clothes and carrying textbooks, although Kinnick's has a football helmet at his feet. On the way into the stadium on gameday, the players will rub his helmet for good luck.

Kinnick and Trice in bronze

Iowa and Iowa State played each other nearly every season from 1894 to 1920, then again in 1933 and 1934, but then not again until 1977. That year, the Cy-Hawk Trophy was first presented. There have been 3 versions, and the current one features each school's bird mascot, Herky the Hawk and Cy the Cardinal. The Hawkeyes lead the rivalry, 42-22.

Ask longtime Iowa fans, and they'll say the Hawkeyes' real arch-rival isn't Iowa State, it's the University of Minnesota. The neighboring State's universities had been playing each other since 1891, and in 1934, things turned nasty over the rough treatment of yet another black player for one of the Iowa schools by Minnesota, Ozzie Simmons.

The rhetoric got really threatening for the 1935 game, and even the Governors got in on it, with Clyde Herring of Iowa saying the Iowa City crowd wouldn't stand for it. He got accused of inciting a riot by Minnesota's Attorney General, Harry Peterson. Peterson's boss, Governor Floyd Olson, decided to lighten the mood, with what is, as far as I can tell, the first friendly bet between politicians representing opposing teams, a Minnesota "prize hog" against one from Iowa. Herring took the bet.

There was no incident at the game, either on the field or in the stands. Simmons walked off the field, receiving handshakes rather than injuries from the Minnesota players. Minnesota won, 13-6, and won their 2nd straight National Championship.

Herring contacted Rosdale Farms outside Fort Dodge, Iowa, and sent the pig to Olson, naming it Floyd of Rosedale for Olson and the farm. Olson then commissioned a trophy to be given annually to the winner of the game, because a 98-pound trophy is easier to move than a several-hundred-pound pig.

Governor Clyde Herring of Iowa (left)

and Governor Floyd Olson of Minnesota,

with the original Floyd of Rosedale, 1935

Iowa has won the last 2 games, and 12 of the last 16, but still trails the overall rivalry, 62-46-2. Since the trophy (counting the original pig) was first awarded in 1934, Minnesota's lead is much slimmer, 42-38.

(Herring, a Democrat, was elected to the U.S. Senate in 1936, but lost in 1942, and died in 1945. Olson, a member of the Farmer-Labor Party, a kind of Socialist party that Hubert Humphrey later merged with the State Democratic Party, wasn't so lucky: He was already dying of cancer at the time of the bet, and passed away 9 months later.)

Iowa also plays Wisconsin for the Heartland Trophy, which is topped not by a bronze pig, but by a brass bull. The Hawkeyes trail this rivalry, 45-43-2.

And they play Nebraska for the Heroes Trophy, which, by comparison, is just an ordinary brass football on top of a base. The Hawkeyes trail, 29-15-3.

Since Iowa and Nebraska border each other, along the Missouri River, and have similar, rural-based, well-traveled, passionate fan bases, each in a State where there is no major league team and each is by far the State's most popular sports team, you would think this would be a big, long-standing rivalry, but because they were in different leagues until Nebraska joined the Big 10 in 2011, they only played each other 6 times between 1947 and 2010.

Aside from the Hawkeyes, Iowa State have a rivalry with one other school, Big 12 opponents Kansas State. They call it "Farmageddon," and they've met every season since 1917. The rivalry is close: ISU leads it 49-47-4. But it's getting closer: KSU has won it 9 straight times, and they'll host this year's game, too.

(UPDATE: Through the 2019 season, the Hawkeyes now lead the Cyclones 46-22, but trail Minnesota 62-50-2, trail Wisconsin 48-44-2, and trail Nebraska 29-19-3. The Cyclones lead Kansas State 51-49-4.)

Stuff. Neither Kinnick Stadium nor Trice Stadium has a big team store. If you want to get school memorabilia, your best bet is to go to each school's bookstore. The Iowa Hawk Shop is at the Iowa Memorial Union, at 125 N. Madison Street in Iowa City. The Iowa State University Book Store (they spell it as 2 words) is at 2229 Lincoln Way in Ames.

There is a definitive book about each school's program, although the Hawkeyes' version could use an update. In 2006, the Cedar Rapids Gazette published Greatest Moments in Iowa Hawkeyes Football History. Earlier this year, Ryan Sloth published Iowa State Cyclones Football A to Z.

There is a DVD produced in 2007 titled Legends of the Iowa Hawkeyes, but no similar video for Iowa State.

During the Game. If you act like a guest who respects your host's house, your safety will not be an issue in either Iowa City or Ames.

One thing I like about Iowa is that their uniforms resemble those of the Pittsburgh Steelers, and while the Steelers changed the font of their numbers in 1996, the Hawkeyes kept theirs, making them look more like the old Steel Curtain than the current Steeler squad does.

The Iowa players enter the field to "Back In Black" by AC/DC, and then the band will play "The Iowa Fight Song." Then they play a part of the recording of Nile Kinnick's Heisman Trophy acceptance speech, before moving on to the National Anthem and the Alma Mater:

I thank God that I was born to the gridirons of the Middle West, and not to the battlefields of Europe. I can speak confidently and positively that the football players of this country would rather fight for the Heisman Trophy than for the Croix de Guerre.

(Kinnick, of course, went on to enlist before Pearl Harbor anyway.)

The Hawkeye Marching Band is led by 2 prestigious positions: The Drum Major, and the Golden Girl, 1 of only 2 full-tuition scholarships in the country available to baton twirlers. The Golden Girl is so prestigious, 3 of them have gone on to be Miss Iowa, and 1 of them Miss Indiana, in the Miss America Pageant.

The Golden Girl is nearly always a blonde,

although the costume is sometimes more black than yellow.

Iowa is the Hawkeye State, a name attributed to the 1830s Sauk leader, Chief Black Hawk, whose name is also the origin of that of the Chicago hockey team. "Hawkeye" was also the nickname of Natty Bumppo, the hero of James Fenimore Cooper's Leatherstocking Tales. (Which also gave Benjamin Franklin Pierce of M*A*S*H his nickname.) An early Iowa newspaper called the local troops fighting in the Black Hawk War "Hawkeyes," and as with the attribution of "Blue Hens" to Delaware and "Tar Heels" to North Carolina during the American Revolution, the name stuck.

Thus, Iowa's mascot is Herky the Hawk, who has appeared in costumed form since 1948. When Hayden Fry arrived as head coach in 1979, he began using the "Tigerhawk" logo for Iowa's helmet design, and Herky was thus redesigned.

It was in 1985, following the Farm Aid concert, that Iowa began sticking a circle above the Tigerhawk's crest, yellow with black letters, ANF, meaning America Needs Farmers. That year, with Chuck Long quarterbacking, Iowa was ranked Number 1 and beat Number 2 Michigan at Kinnick Stadium, on the way to winning the Big 10, but lost the Rose Bowl to UCLA, blowing the National Championship.

Between the 3rd and 4th quarters, the Hawkeye Marching Band plays the Beatles' "Hey Jude." They have done so since the song was new in 1968, which must have been a shock to all those conservative Iowa farm folk. After the game, if Iowa wins, the Band plays "The Hawkeye Victory Polka," a variant of "In Heaven, There Is No Beer." (Refrain: "That's why we drink it here.") This has been problematic, given that most college students are under age 21, but attempts to ban it have failed.

In 1895, Iowa suffered a lot of tornadoes, or cyclones. In September, Iowa Agricultural College, as ISU was then known, was calling their teams the Cardinals, after their school color, cardinal red. They went to Chicago and beat Northwestern 36-0, and the Chicago Tribune's headline was "Struck By a Cyclone: It comes from Iowa, and devastates Evanston town."

The team has been the Cyclones ever since. But how do you represent a cyclone/tornado as a mascot? Rather than answer that question, ISU went with their color, named the bird after cyclones, and created Cy the Cardinal.

Ironically, in 2005, a real tornado delayed a game between Iowa State and Colorado, and when it passed, and the fans filed back into Trice Stadium, they were so riled up that they spurred the Cyclones on to an upset win. Since then, a tornado siren has been activated after ISU touchdowns.

Like Rutgers, Iowa State has a cannon that they fire off as the team takes the field before the game, at each half's kickoff, after every Iowa State kickoff, and after a home win. Also after a home win, a Victory Bell has been rung. It is in the stadium's north end, and was at their previous stadium, Clyde Williams Field. Like the Hawkeyes, their fight song has a very generic title, "The Iowa State Fight Song."

UPDATE: After I posted this, a "new tradition" was added to Hawkeyes games: The Iowa Wave. Their fans turn to the University of Iowa Stead Family Children's Hospital, facing Kinnick Stadium, at the end of the 1st quarter, to wave up to the kids receiving treatment at the hospital.

After the Game. There's not much to eat around Trice Stadium. You may have to go back to downtown Ames. There isn't much more around Kinnick Stadium, although a restaurant named Stella is at 1006 Melrose Avenue, just outside the stadium's southwest corner. Again, for a variety of choices, you'll have to go downtown, back across the Iowa River.

The Hamburg Inn #2 is a diner, said to be "legendary" and to have great, well, hamburgers. 214 N. Linn Street, downtown. However, not only has the famed Tuck's Place, 2 doors down at 210 N. Linn, closed for good, but so has its replacement, I.C. Ugly's.

The leading bar showing European soccer in Iowa is Donnelly's Pub, at 110 E. College Street, in Iowa City.

Sidelights. Carver-Hawkeye Arena is at 1 Elliot Drive, about a 5-minute walk northwest of Kinnick Stadium. Since 1983, it has been home to Iowa basketball, but, more importantly, has been home to Iowa wrestling, which has been so successful, it makes John Wooden's UCLA basketball dynasty look like Rutgers football.

From 1975 to 2010, they won 23 National Championships. This included 9 straight from 1978 to 1986, under coach Dan Gable, himself once the greatest wrestler -- and I mean real wrestling -- in American history, including a Gold Medal at the 1972 Olympics. Oddly, his only loss was in his last collegiate match, denying him 4 straight individual National Championships. Even more ironically, he wrestled at... Iowa State. And it was Iowa State that denied Iowa the 10th straight title in 1987. That was their 8th National Championship, including the 1969, '70 and '72 titles that Gable helped them win, but they have never won another.

Carver-Hawkeye Arena on a rainy day

Previously, Iowa used the Iowa Field House for basketball, wrestling, and other indoor sports. Their basketball team reached what we would now call the Final Four in 1955, 1956 and 1980. At Grand Avenue and Hospital Drive, separated from Kinnick Stadium by the University of Iowa Hospital.

Iowa State played football at Clyde Williams Field from 1914 to 1974. With the opening of the new stadium, it was demolished in 1978, and Martin and Eaton Residence Halls were built on the site. 135 Beyer Court, off the intersection of Lincoln Way and Sheldon Avenue.

Iowa has 6 minor-league baseball teams, all but 1 of them in Class A. The Triple-A team is the Iowa Cubs, who play (never mind the name) in the Pacific Coast League. They've won just 1 Pennant, in the old American Association, in 1993, despite the Great Mississippi River Flood of that year, and last made the Playoffs in 2008.

Their home is the 11,500-seat Principal Park, in Des Moines, where the Des Moines and Raccoon Rivers meet. The address is 1 Line Drive, at SW 2nd Street. The previous ballpark on the site, Sec Taylor Stadium, stood from 1947 to 1991. It was home to the Western League's Des Moines Bruins, the Three-I League's (Illinois-Indiana-Iowa) Des Moines Demons (Pennant winners in 1954 and 1955), and the American Association's Iowa Oaks, a White Sox farm team, before they switched Chicago teams in 1981. Just 3 blocks away is Iowa's foremost museum, the Science Center of Iowa, at 401 W. Martin Luther King Jr. Parkway.

There is an independent team, the Sioux City Explorers, in the new version of the American Association. And there are 4 teams in the Class A Midwest League: The Burlington Bees, the Cedar Rapids Kernels, the Clinton LumberKings, and the Quad Cities River Bandits. The Bandits are famed for their ballpark, now named Modern Woodmen Park, next to the Centennial Bridge, connecting their city of Davenport, Iowa to Rock Island, Illinois. Under its previous name of John O'Donnell Stadium, the stadium got hit with the Great Flood of 1993, much worse than the Des Moines park did.

Iowa City is 223 miles from Chicago, 260 from St. Louis, 302 from Minneapolis, and 306 from Kansas City. According to a recent survey, 36 percent of people in the area are Cub fans, 16 percent St. Louis Cardinal fans, 9 percent White Sox fans, and the Twins and Royals don't register. Not surprisingly, the most popular teams in the other leagues are also the closest, the Chicago teams: The Bears in the NFL, the Bulls in the NBA, the Blackhawks in the NHL, and the Fire in MLS.

Iowa's greatest sports legends are the aforementioned Nile Kinnick and Jack Trice, and Baseball Hall of Fame pitcher Bob Feller. However, since Kinnick was lost at sea and never recovered, he has no official final resting place. And because Trice was from a town outside Cleveland, and Feller pitched his whole career in Cleveland, they're both buried in cemeteries near that city, not in Iowa.

The Beatles never performed live in Iowa, but Elvis did. In addition to his concert at Iowa State in 1976, he sang at the Veterans Memorial Auditorium in Des Moines on May 22, 1956; June 20, 1974; and June 23, 1977, on his last tour. 833 5th Avenue. The Wells Fargo Arena, home of the Iowa Wild, farm team of the Minnesota Wild, is across the street, at 733 3rd Street.

He also sang at the Municipal Auditorium in Sioux City on May 23, 1956. It is now known as the Long Lines Family Recreation Center (not an encouraging name), and stands at 401 Gordon Drive, on the Missouri River, across from South Sioux City, Nebraska.

Iowa has produced a President, but he was one of the least successful: Herbert Hoover. He was born at West Branch in 1874, and lived there until he was 11, when, orphaned, he was taken in by an uncle in Oregon.

Though he never lived in Iowa again, and lived on the Stanford University campus and in Washington, D.C. most of his pre-Presidency adult life, and at the Waldorf Towers in New York after his disastrous Presidency (1929-33), he decided to build his Presidential Library and Museum, and to be buried, at his birthplace. 210 Parkside Drive in West Branch, about 10 miles east of downtown Iowa City. Not accessible by public transportation.

The tallest building in the State of Iowa is the Principal Building, built in 1991 and standing 630 feet (the same height as the Gateway Arch in St. Louis), in downtown Des Moines at 801 Grand Street.

The only remotely successful TV show to be set in Iowa is American Pickers. No, the Hooterville shows -- CBS' rural 1960s sitcoms Petticoat Junction and Green Acres -- were not set in Iowa. Though there were hints that Hooterville was near Chicago and Omaha (which would make Iowa the best candidate), the lack of consistency in 20th Century TV shows meant that the location was all over the place, and other hints suggest it was in either Kentucky or North Carolina.

By far the most famous movie set or filmed in Iowa is the baseball fantasy Field of Dreams, based on W.P. Kinsella's novel Shoeless Joe. The actual farm where it was filmed is in Iowa, in Dyersville, at 28995 Lansing Road.

It is 24 miles west of the nearest city of note, Dubuque; 77 miles northeast of Kinnick Stadium; 170 miles northeast of Des Moines; 200 miles northwest of Chicago. In fact, Milwaukee is slightly closer than Chicago, making it the closest major league city. "People will come," it was said, and they do, but it's by car: No public transit is available.

Other films set in Iowa include State Fair (2 versions, 1933 and 1945), The Pajama Game, The Music Man, Elvis' movies Double Trouble and The Trouble With Girls, Cold Turkey, What's Eating Gilbert Grape, and the film version of Robert James Waller's novel The Bridges of Madison County.

Twister was set in Oklahoma, and the film version of Stephen King's Children of the Corn was set in Nebraska, but both were filmed in Iowa, which does have a lot of tornadoes and corn.

Star Trek's Captain James T. Kirk was said by series creator Gene Roddenberry to have been born on March 22, 2233, in Riverside, Iowa, population just under 1,000. The town has accepted and promoted this, and has set up a "Future Birthplace" on 1st Street, between Washburn and Glasgow. It's about 14 miles south of Iowa City, but, again, forget about taking public transport. Maybe Scotty can beam you there.

No Trek TV show or movie depicted Kirk's Iowa hometown until the 2009 J.J. Abrams abomination. This movie was so bad! (How bad was it?) It was so bad, it seemed to suggest that the Grand Canyon was in Iowa. Note to Abrams: Not only is Iowa prairie, not desert and mountains, but the Grand Canyon is in Arizona, you idiot! And there's no way the starship USS Enterprise would have been built there, or anywhere on the ground. It was built in space, at the San Francisco Yards, in synchronous orbit over the Earth, over San Francisco, where Starfleet Headquarters and Starfleet Academy are. (Within the lore of the real show and films, of course.)

Another notable fictional character from Iowa, from Ottumwa in the southeastern corner of the State, was Corporal Walter Eugene O'Reilly, a.k.a. "Radar," the company clerk at the 4077th Mobile Army Surgical Hospital in the Korean War. Gary Burghoff was the only actor from the film version of M*A*S*H (1970) to also play the role on TV (doing so from 1972 to 1979).

*

Iowa has no major league sports, and just the 1 Triple-A (or other-sports equivalent) team. And Iowa's and Iowa State's basketball and wrestling teams just aren't as big. College football is it in Iowa, and what an "it" it is.