Paul Hornung

Paul Vernon Hornung was born in 1935 in Louisville, Kentucky. His parents separated in 1939 while Paul was still a young child and throughout his life he remained particularly close to his mother. Hornung fell in love with football as a boy, even ignoring the new bicycle he received one Christmas in favor of another present—a football. His mother would later recall how whenever football practice let out early enough, Hornung would race home on his bike to be able to play again in a neighborhood pick-up game. "He loved playing football twice a day," she told the Los Angeles Times.

Hornung was enthusiastic about most sports. At Louisville's Flaget High School, he pitched for the baseball team, was a twenty-point forward on the basketball team, and quarterbacked for the football team. He was the school's star athlete, indeed one of the best in all Kentucky, and it was assumed that he would go on to attend the University of Kentucky. However, when his football team won the state championship and Hornung was named the state's most valuable player, recruiters from colleges across the country began to knock on the Hornung family's door. Hornung's talent was great and the scholarship offers were just as extravagant. Besides full scholarships, schools offered Hornung cash bonuses, clothing and cars. One even promised a scholarship for his girlfriend too. Hornung was leaning toward U. of Kentucky, but when Notre Dame came calling, Mrs. Hornung, a devout Catholic, urged Paul to accept their scholarship. It was not a difficult decision. Hornung had already realized he liked playing on winning teams and figured he have a good chance of winning again with the Fighting Irish. He was also impressed by Notre Dame's coach, Frank Leahy.

Hornung began displaying his gridiron versatility at Notre Dame. When he arrived at the school, the team already possessed a fine quarterback in Ralph Guglielmi, and Hornung was put at halfback. Although he had never played the position before, before long he was starting there, and to such fanfare that a Louisville sports writer dubbed the strapping, six-foot blond Hornung, the "Golden Boy," a nickname that would stick with him throughout his career and into his retirement. Hornung finally became quarterback when he was a senior. The injury-laden team was only able to win two games all season. Hornung turned in a well-rounded performance—he ran, threw, tackled, kicked, and called plays. Harold Red Grange told the New York Times that Hornung was "the best running back I saw all year." At the end of the season Hornung won the Heisman trophy.