Rally

Two years after a life-threatening accident, alum reflects on the strong support that played a role in his miraculous recovery

BY TAMARA FYNAARDT

DOUG BURG

Ardie Keune ’79 holds a football in his hands. That he can not only grasp it, but stand, throw it and chase it down if he wants to, is … well, it’s a miracle.

The Sioux Rapids, Iowa, chiropractor was on his way to the Sturgis, S.D., Motorcycle Rally in August 2015 when his Harley-Davidson was struck from behind by a driver trying to escape law enforcement. The SUV that hit Ardie was going more than 100 miles per hour and crashed shortly after colliding with him.

Former Raider football teammate Blaine “Dusty” Duistermars ’80 was traveling with Ardie and was the first one to reach him. “I supported his head. Blood all over. One of his legs sticking out in the wrong direction,” he recalled in an interview with the Des Moines Register this past April. Duistermars was also the first one to know that the call to the ambulance telling them it was “a cold one” was wrong. Ardie was alive.

DOUG BURG

Despite lingering effects of his accident—he'll likely need physical therapy the rest of his life—Ardie is grateful he’s still around to watch his daughter compete as a Red Raider herself. “I just want to be with my wife and watch my daughter grow up,” he says.

Ardie’s wife, B.B., still gets teary talking about those early days—his extensive injuries, numerous broken bones (shoulder, right leg, left hand and foot, eight ribs), and worrisome brain scan that Ardie’s trauma surgeon described as looking like scrambled eggs. The surgeon later admitted he thought Ardie’s chances of survival were around one percent. When B.B. and their daughter, Kenzie, now a Northwestern sophomore, arrived at the Rapid City, S.D., hospital where Ardie had been taken, Kenzie didn’t recognize her dad.

Living minute to minute, as B.B. describes it—through multiple surgeries, setbacks and moments when his medical team thought they still might lose him—the patient dubbed “miracle man” by his nurses improved. B.B.’s worries changed from wondering whether her husband would live to wondering what kind of life he would have. Though Ardie remembers very little of the time he spent in the hospital, he smiles and reaches for his wife's hand as she tells about the first time she heard him speak, two weeks after the accident. B.B. and a Rapid City pastor were praying near his bed. When they finished, Ardie said in a raspy voice, “Amen.”

During Ardie’s six-week hospitalization and his more than three months of intense physical and occupational therapy at a rehabilitation hospital in Lincoln, Neb., B.B. and Kenzie kept family and friends updated with Facebook posts. More than once she passed along wisdom shared by Ardie’s doctors, nurses and therapists, that “patients that do the best are the ones who are fully supported by family and friends … we need your support and love and presence.”

The Keunes’ community delivered. B.B. gets teary talking about this too. Memory books compiled by friends document a #KeunDawgStrong-themed benefit hosted at the Sioux Rapids Fire Station, and B.B.’s social media messages are filled with expressions of thanks to people who went above and beyond supporting her and Ardie and driving Kenzie back and forth to Rapid City and Lincoln. Dr. Tim Aberson ’89, from Paullina, Iowa, took over for Ardie at his chiropractic clinic. Friends welcomed Kenzie into their home, and her volleyball teammates buoyed her spirits as her parents missed her senior season.

DOUG BURG

During former Raider football player Ardie Keune’s long recovery from a life-threatening motorcycle accident, his former teammates rallied around him. They visited and gave him a football with notes of encouragement. Coach Larry Korver visited more than once, even bringing cinnamon rolls and cookies for former player #70.

Ardie’s former teammates rallied for him too. Duistermars stayed with him when he could and kept the rest of the Raider gridiron gang informed. Ardie starts to list some of those who visited—former coaches Larry “Bubb” Korver ’54, Mel Tjeerdsma and Cornie Wassink ’73 and teammates Orv Otten ’79 and Jim Svoboda ’83—then he stops because there were so many and he doesn’t want to forget to name someone.

While the former All-American offensive lineman and NFL try-out gutted it out through six-a-day physical therapy sessions, his teammates sent around a football, covering the leather with well wishes and Bible verses about fight, courage and strength. Among the more than 30 messages from players who back in the day went by nicknames like Beef, Muffin, Neuty and Zeut, is encouragement from Coach Korver: “God saved your life so that you can be an example for others.”

“He’s the example, though,” says Ardie, who’d rather talk about how people like Korver inspire him. “He’s quite a man. And isn’t that just like him to always be coaching.”

For video, photos and more of Ardie’s recovery story as reported by Mike Kilen in the April 12, 2017, Des Moines Register, visit tinyurl.com/dmrkeune.