James Kirk "Runt" Newell (November 4, 1890 – January 15, 1967) was an American football and baseball player for the Auburn Tigers of

Auburn University Auburn University (AU or Auburn) is a public land-grant research university in Auburn, Alabama. With more than 24,600 undergraduate students and a total enrollment of more than 30,000 with 1,330 faculty members, Auburn is the second largest uni ...

. He lettered four years in both, as well as once in each of basketball,

track Track or Tracks may refer to: Routes or imprints * Ancient trackway, any track or trail whose origin is lost in antiquity * Animal track, imprints left on surfaces that an animal walks across * Desire path, a line worn by people taking the shorte ...

, and

soccer Association football, more commonly known as football or soccer, is a team sport played between two teams of 11 players who primarily use their feet to propel the ball around a rectangular field called a pitch. The objective of the game is ...

. He was inducted into the Alabama Sports Hall of Fame in 1994.

Early years

Kirk Newell was born on November 4, 1890 in Dadeville, Alabama to James Wesley Newell and Mary Ella Wise.

Auburn University

Newell was a prominent member of Mike Donahue's football teams which over his four years from

1910 Events January * January 13 – The first public radio broadcast takes place; live performances of the operas '' Cavalleria rusticana'' and ''Pagliacci'' are sent out over the airwaves, from the Metropolitan Opera House in New York C ...

1913 Events January * January 5 – First Balkan War: Battle of Lemnos (1913), Battle of Lemnos – Greek admiral Pavlos Kountouriotis forces the Turkish fleet to retreat to its base within the Dardanelles, from which it will not ven ...

, accumulating a win–loss–tie record of 24–4–2 () and outscored opponents 639 to 111. He was a member of an All-time Auburn Tigers football team selected in 1935, put at quarterback, as well as on coach Donahue's all-time Auburn team. At Auburn, he was a member of

Pi Kappa Alpha Pi Kappa Alpha (), commonly known as PIKE, is a college fraternity founded at the University of Virginia in 1868. The fraternity has over 225 chapters and colonies across the United States and abroad with over 15,500 undergraduate members over 30 ...

. He was nominated though not selected for an ''Associated Press'' All-Time Southeast 1869-1919 era team.

1913

He was captain of the

Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association The Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association (SIAA) was one of the first collegiate athletic conferences in the United States. Twenty-seven of the current Division I FBS (formerly Division I-A) football programs were members of this conferen ...

(SIAA) champion 1913 team. which has been selected as a national champion by various selectors retroactively. Newell gained 1,707 yards that year, 46% of the team's entire offensive output; and 5,800 yards rushing, 350 yards receiving, and 1,200 yards on punt returns for his career. One writer claims "Auburn had a lot of great football teams, but there may not have been one greater than the 1913-1914 team."

1920

Newell later coached on the Auburn football team upon graduation, and for a short time in the 1920s.

First World War

Newell received the Distinguished Service Award for his service in the First World War. According to David Housel, while in France Newell laid on top of a

hand grenade A grenade is an explosive weapon typically thrown by hand (also called hand grenade), but can also refer to a shell (explosive projectile) shot from the muzzle of a rifle (as a rifle grenade) or a grenade launcher. A modern hand grenade genera ...

set to explode on a group of people he knew, taking the brunt of the explosion himself. Newell was severely wounded after the act of selflessness. 36 pieces of scrap iron were removed from his body. He also played football during the war, as the quarterback on the Camp Gordon team in 1917.

References

External links

Alabama Sports Hall of Fame profile
{{DEFAULTSORT:Newell, Kirk 1890 births 1967 deaths American football halfbacks American men's basketball players Association footballers not categorized by position Auburn Tigers football players Camp Gordon football players Auburn Tigers baseball players Auburn Tigers football coaches Auburn Tigers men's basketball players Auburn Tigers men's soccer players Auburn Tigers men's track and field athletes All-Southern college football players People from Tallapoosa County, Alabama Coaches of American football from Alabama Players of American football from Alabama Baseball players from Alabama Basketball players from Alabama Soccer players from Alabama Track and field athletes from Alabama Association football players not categorized by nationality