Ray Nitschke

Raymond Ernest Nitschke (December 29, 1936 – March 8, 1998) was an American professional football player who spent his entire 15-year career as a linebacker in the National Football League with the Green Bay Packers. He was the anchor of the defense under head coach Vince Lombardi during the 1960s, leading the Packers to five NFL championships and victories in the first two Super Bowls.

Nitschke was born in Elmwood Park, Illinois, the youngest of three sons to Robert and Anna Nitschke. His father was killed in a car accident in 1940, and his mother died of a blood clot when Nitschke was thirteen. His older brothers, Robert Jr. and Richard, then twenty-one and seventeen, raised him on their own. He entered Proviso Township High School in Maywood shortly before his mother's death, where during his freshman year he played fullback on one of the school's three football teams. He was a poor student.

Nitschke was enshrined in the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 1978.