Mike Kielkopf

Kinnick - the Novel Mike Kielkopf

Iowa's only Heisman Trophy winner was more than just a great football player. Nile Kinnick was a rare human being, a young man of ideals, intellect and empathy. He turned down pro football and became a WW II Navy fighter pilot. He died when his plane crashed into the Caribbean in 1943, but what if he had lived? This novel explains his football exploits first, but then -- based on Kinnick's own writings -- offers the first definitive exploration of the life that might have been. As the College Football News has written, "No player in college football history means more to his state than Nile Kinnick means to Iowa."