Offensive linemen rarely get the recognition they deserve. The are the "grunts" of football, the men who rarely get credit for anything but almost always get the blame. They are almost anonymous on the playing field unless there is a penalty. Then, their names reverberate throughout the stadium as the public address announcer tells everyone of the mistake they just made.

With that typical experience as part of one's football life, it is a wonder anyone ever plays on the offensive line. But the great ones not only want to play, they love to play. One such man is Keith Dorney, who in 2005 became the first pure offensive lineman for Penn State to be elected to the National Football Foundation College Football Hall of Fame.

"It's a tremendous honor," Dorney said. "When you see the names of the people who are in the Hall of Fame and the Penn State players who are included you realize what an honor it is to be among all those great athletes."

Dorney became the 20th Penn State player of coach to be inducted into the Hall of Fame, but he is the first offensive tackle, guard or center. All the other linemen, except for end Ted Kwalick, were either two-way players of earlier eras or defensive specialists.

Dorney was one of Penn State's best offensive linemen - as well as a living testament to Coach Joe Paterno's philosophy that smart kids can be great athletes. He grew up in Macungie, which is near Allentown, and his great-great grandfather once was part of the Dorney Park ownership.

Dorney began as a tight end at Penn State and made his first start in the 1976 Sugar Bowl against Alabama. In 1976, he became the starting center and when he moved to tackle the next year, he became a first team All-American. In his senior year, Dorney's All-American selection was nearly unanimous when picked by the AP, UPI, Football Writers, NEA and Walter Camp. Just as significantly, Dorney was named a First Team Academic All-American.

In addition, Dorney finished 10th in the balloting for the Lombardi Trophy won by teammate and defensive tackle Bruce Clark as the nation's outstanding lineman/linebacker. As one sportswriter raved, Dorney was the type of offensive lineman who "just knocked everyone down."

Dorney was one of the reasons the Nittany Lions of 1977 and 1978 reeled off consecutive 11-1 campaigns. The 1977 squad won its last eight games, capped by a victory over Arizona State in the Fiesta Bowel to earn the No. 5 final AP ranking. In 1978, Penn State took an 11-0 regular season mark, a 19-game overall winning streak and the No. 1 ranking into the Sugar Bowl but lost to Alabama, 14-7. That game remains the most disappointing one of his entire playing career.

The Detroit Lions made Dorney their number one draft choice and he had an All-Pro career until retiring in 1988. He chronicled that professional experience in a book published by Triumph Books in 2004 entitle: "Black and Honolulu Blue: In the Trenches of the NFL." What's even more noteworthy is that he wrote the book himself, without assistance of a ghostwriter that most athletes employ for their autobiographies.

Writing is Dorney's passion and he is now working on a football novel as well as another non-fiction book. But that is his avocation. For the last three year he has been teaching English to freshman and senior at Cardinal Newmann High School in nearby Santa Rosa, CA as well as coaching the football team's offensive line.

Although he earned a business degree at Penn State, he left the business world in 2000 and began teaching special education at several schools in the Northern California's Sonoma win country while earning his Masters Degree in Education from the University of San Francisco. He lives on several acres in rural Sebastapool, CA with his wife, Katherine and their two children, Clay, 18, and Alea, 14.

"I really didn't know what I wanted to do when I left the Detroit Lions," Dorney said. "Pro football was a wonderful experience, but one negative was that it took me that much longer to find out what I wanted to be when I grew up. I tried real estate and a few other business ventures, but it just didn't feel right. I finally found my calling in teaching and writing."