Glenn Killinger, All American: Penn State's World War I Sports Hero by Todd M. Mealy (review)

William Glenn Killinger was a famous athlete during World War I and the postwar period. Outstanding sportswriters praised him. Grantland Rice called him "one of the greatest running quarterbacks" and predicted for him a bright future in sports. Glenn Scobey "Pop" Warner and John Heisman compared him favorably to Jim Thorpe, America's greatest multisports athlete. One Philadelphia sportswriter called him "the greatest running back in the history of the game" (10). In this study of Killinger and the times in which he lived, Todd Mealy reminds readers of his achievements.

William Glenn Killinger was born on September 13, 1898. His paternal great-grandfather emigrated from Germany to the United States in the early nineteenth century and settled as a farmer in Dauphin County, Pennsylvania. Nothing is known about his great-grandmother. His father eventually owned a hardware store in Harrisburg. His mother, Florence Wilson, was the daughter of Henry Harrison Wilson, a veteran of the Civil War. She was known as an "impressing woman" (18) who forbade her youngest child to box and to serve in the armed forces. His brother Earl, five years older and a good athlete, exerted the most influence on the young boy as Glenn Killinger grew up in Harrisburg's multi-ethnic Allison Hill neighborhood. As a student in the city's Technical High School, he, at five feet, six inches and 140 pounds showed little potential for stardom in football. Although he liked to play basketball, tennis, golf, and handball, football was his favorite game.

Killinger seemed to be aimless after graduating from high school. Mealy explains that he had no desire to follow up on his "Industrial Career" studies" (50). Secretly, however, he wanted to follow his hometown hero Shorty Miller, a Walter Camp third-team quarterback at the Pennsylvania State College. During a gap year, while playing on local baseball and basketball teams, he earned and borrowed sufficient funds to become the first in his family to attend college. In the fall of 1917 Killinger became a metallurgy major, "one of the most respected and rigorous programs" (59). He joined Phi Alpha Sigma, a social fraternity that provided him a room, after putting him through three weeks of disgusting hazing. During his years at Penn State, most of his grades were Cs and Ds; nevertheless, coaches permitted him to play three sports in each of his last three years. It is likely that he would be declared ineligible today. Of course, he wanted to play freshman football. As he watched the "big and burley" players scrimmage, he decided to forego freshman football. Instead, he became a supporter (66–67). Never without a sport to play, a two-inch-taller and twenty-pounds-heavier Killinger became a "contributing force at guard" (71) on the freshman basketball team. One of the observers was head football coach Dick Harlow, who invited Killinger to come out for spring football practice, which he did, though he left early to play baseball.

The entrance of the United States into World War I influenced college sports in several ways. Some schools canceled their football seasons, even though government officials urged them to play. Many players went off to war, which depleted their schools' teams. Coach Harlow's decision to join the exodus left Killinger wondering about Penn State's sports. College president Edwin Earl Sparks relieved his anxiety by appointing Hugo Bezdek as Harlow's successor. Mealy includes a brief biographical sketch of the Prague-born immigrant (82–86). Killinger was pleased with Bezdek as coach because he knew that he was a winner. When the government called nine Penn State starting football players to machine-gun camp in Georgia, Bezdek inserted Killinger at halfback.

Initially, Killinger was elated. When the next game was canceled because of the Spanish influenza epidemic, he considered himself "the most disappointed player on the squad" (95–96). Later in the season...