Emery Family - Person Sheet
NameNile Clark Kinnick Jr. 
Birth9 Jul 1918, Adel, Iowa
Death2 Jun 1943, Venezuela
ReligionChristian Science
FatherNile Clark Kinnick Sr.
MotherFrancis Ada Clarke (1894-1966)
Misc. Notes
On November 28, 1939, Nile Kinnick won the Heisman Trophy, becoming to date the only Iowa Hawkeye to win college football's most prestigious award.
On June 2, 1943, Ensign Kinnick was on a routine training flight from the aircraft carrier USS Lexington (CV-16), which was off the coast of Venezuela in the Gulf of Paria. Kinnick had been flying for over an hour when his Grumman F4F Wildcat developed an oil leak so serious that he could neither reach land nor the Lexington, whose flight deck was in any case crowded with planes preparing for launch. Kinnick followed standard military procedure and executed an emergency landing in the water, but died in the process. Rescue boats arrived on the scene a mere eight minutes later, but they found only an oil slick. His body was never recovered. Nile Kinnick was the first Heisman Trophy winner to die; he was a month and seven days away from his 25th birthday.
Iowa sportscaster Tait Cummins said, "Kinnick proved one thing, that college athletics could be beautiful. Everything that can be said that is good about college athletics he was. He didn't represent it...he was it."
On June 2, 1943, Ensign Kinnick was on a routine training flight from the aircraft carrier USS Lexington (CV-16), which was off the coast of Venezuela in the Gulf of Paria. Kinnick had been flying for over an hour when his Grumman F4F Wildcat developed an oil leak so serious that he could neither reach land nor the Lexington, whose flight deck was in any case crowded with planes preparing for launch. Kinnick followed standard military procedure and executed an emergency landing in the water, but died in the process. Rescue boats arrived on the scene a mere eight minutes later, but they found only an oil slick. His body was never recovered. Nile Kinnick was the first Heisman Trophy winner to die; he was a month and seven days away from his 25th birthday.
Iowa sportscaster Tait Cummins said, "Kinnick proved one thing, that college athletics could be beautiful. Everything that can be said that is good about college athletics he was. He didn't represent it...he was it."