KURT AND BRENDA WARNER HAVE TURNED LIFE’S CHALLENGES INTO AN ENDURING DRIVE TO GIVE Heart Treasures of the COVER STORY {by karen werner }

DECEMBER 2019 | FRONTDOORS MEDIA 23 Yes, that Kurt Warner. The Hall of Fame quarterback whose 12-year career is one of the greatest stories in NFL history. So let’s get the basics out of the way. Not drafted out of college, Kurt got cut by the Green Bay Packers and wound up bagging groceries at a Hy-Vee to pay the bills before signing with the Arena League. He went on to become an NFL star playing for the St. Louis Rams, winning the Most Valuable Player Award and leading the team to a Super Bowl win in his first year. He had a second act with a celebrated run with the Arizona Cardinals, leading the team to its first Super Bowl berth before retiring in 2010. The only person inducted into both the Pro Football Hall of Fame and the Arena Football Hall of Fame, his rags-to-riches story is legendary. But it’s not remotely the most interesting thing about him. To learn that, you have to travel back decades to when he met the love of his life at a country-and- western bar. Brenda was a divorced mother of two who needed to get out of the house. She and her mother took a line-dancing class, and Brenda stayed with friends after her mom left. That’s when she noticed Kurt. “I thought he was cute, but I come from a marriage with an affair, so I was like, ‘No way,’” Brenda said. But providence had other plans. “We did this dance called the barn dance, where you switch partners, and at the end, he was my partner,” Brenda said. “He asked if I wanted to keep dancing and we danced until they flicked the lights at the bar.” When Kurt walked Brenda to her car at the end of the night, she gave him the low-down. She had young kids and wasn’t interested in games. If this night was all they had, that was fine. She left without a kiss. The next morning, there was a knock on the door of her parents’ house, where Brenda was living at Brenda Warner doesn’t want this story to be about football. “I don’t like football,” she said in her no-nonsense way. Instead, the former Marine would prefer it to be about the things that she does love: her family, her metalwork and Treasure House, the home for adults with developmental disorders she founded with her husband, Kurt.