Frank Kinney Holbrook - Name Confusion

Name Confusion

The correct name of the first black football player at the University of Iowa is Frank Kinney Holbrook, not Carleton William Holbrook. The apparent misinformation may have begun around 1939 when the University’s athletics department released a commemorative publication about Iowa football referring to “C.W. Holbrook.” C.W. Holbrook was the only other student with that last name enrolled at the University of Iowa during the mid-1890s, according to general catalogs issued by the University at the time. However, C.W. Holbrook was a law student from Manchester, Iowa, and was not on the football team. Frank Kinney Holbrook (called “Kinney” by his teammates, according to one edition of the Hawkeye yearbook) was a sophomore when he competed as a halfback in the fall of 1896. According to University alumni records, he did not graduate. C.W. Holbrook graduated in 1897 and his name is the only Holbrook that appears in alumni lists from that period. As a result, it is possible that C.W. Holbrook’s name, and not that of Frank Kinney Holbrook, was brought forward by mistake. Numerous publications subsequently repeated the error, including the McGrane and Bright titles cited below. Bright’s work has no citations; McGrane quotes an undated Chicago Times-Herald article which uses only Holbrook’s last name.