Pursuing a passion fro
American football enthusiast Klatt has a
ON THE face of it, there seems to be very little to connect Sioux City, the fourth largest metropolis in the U.S. state of Iowa, and little old Gorey.
One is a moderately sized, American city, big enough to keep ticking over while smaller country towns fell into disrepair, yet not large enough to gain traction against bigger sprawling urban areas like Chicago to the east or the Twin Cities to the north.
Unlike Sioux City, which has seen its population remain largely stagnant since the 1940s, Gorey had been sucked into the commuter belt in the last couple of decades, going from sleepy small town to a popular destination for those working in the capital who can’t afford sky-high Dublin prices.
But trends need setters. Long before it was popular for movers from the big cities to descend on Wexford’s third biggest town, Gorey got an import from the tallgrass prairie who has added far more value to the community than probably even he could have imagined.
Kevin Klatt moved to Sioux City when he was five and spent his formative years there. It became home, it became the place of sweet memories, of quintessential middle America. It was diners and donut shops, it was pharmacies with apothecary cabinets and soda pop machines.
‘I always tell people that if I could pick anywhere in the world to grow up again, if I could go back and do it all again, I’d go straight back to the neighbourhood I grew up in in Sioux City,’ Kevin enthused.
‘Absolutely brilliant place, really really good people, friendly, hard working, no airs and graces, everybody went out [and] earned a living, the kids went to school, played a lot of sports, you know, played outside.
‘Doors weren’t locked, there was always something to do because it was a big enough city that there was always something going on, plenty of places to go out for dinner. It was just a really really, I would consider, idyllic, childhood to be honest.’
Football, of the American variety, was pretty much always part of Kevin’s life. From the age of five his father had him and his brother out on the lawn, practicing tackling drills, preparing them for challenges that would start in high school.
‘I would have been 14 or 15 and that’s the first time you could put on pads, so four years you could play American football in high school back then and that was it,’ he explained.
‘They had what they called Junior high school teams which would be your freshman year, then they would have a sophomore team as well, and then after that you kicked it up to Junior and Senior year with playing for the varsity team.’
As a multi-sport high school athlete (Kevin played basketball, baseball and also ran track), he certainly kept himself busy. It therefore came as no surprise when Kevin agreed to head east across the state to N.C.A.A. Division 3’s Wartburg College.
Unfortunately, Kevin’s collegiate football career didn’t last long, despite working his way from fifth string quarter-back to QB2, as he explained: ‘I was running the second unit and we had a practice one day, we were doing two-a-day at that stage (two sessions), it was August just before the season was starting.
‘I called an option to the right, so I came down the line of scrimmage and the defensive end, who was a Senior, he was on the starting defence. I faked the pitch and he bit on the fake and I turned it up field and gained about 15 yards.
‘The coach blew the whistle and he went over to the defensive end and he picked him up and he screamed in his face: “you would let a freshman do that to you and you expect to be a starting defensive end” and he went absolutely mad at him after it. I made the absolute rookie error, I went back to the huddle and I said same play.
‘We go down, I fake the hand-off, starting down the line and I see this guy, his name’s Charlie Enright, coming towards me and he committe and pitched the ball picked up another 15 was nobody left out t
‘But what happene head to make the pitc kind of from the grou of his helmet launche snapped it in two.
‘I actually didn’t t went back to practice couldn’t eat dinner, I c the next morning, an and I said “problem
‘He sent me straig the dentist did the x-ra your jaw is broken in out of practice again only two quarterbac practice once the sea back down to where way back to a playin
‘[It was] very disap go out the second y been treated pretty b after that. Next time came to Ireland.’
But that was a few for Klatt. He came o editor’s role with a newspaper in Red La which, along the wa couple of articles ab the Minnesota Whea tion (now Minnesota A Growers).
Little did Kevin kn uous pieces would the course his life wa growers liked his wo a position.
Reluctant to take t stipulations he thou cepted, including dou also sending him to E
When they relente off he went to Genev Food Agreements. story there:
‘I went to Europe i basically they didn’t h to do, they just let m let me do what I wan
‘My aunt, who was