Illinois
Meet the American who coined ‘March Madness,’ Illinois high school hoops pioneer and visionary H.V. Porter
March Insanity afflicts tens of millions of American sports activities followers every spring.
Victims of the fever exhibit spontaneous outbreaks of basketball jargon, cry over busted brackets and name in sick to work on Thursdays and Fridays.
There isn’t any identified treatment for March Insanity.
However basketballogists know its origin. The illness was first recognized in 1939 by Illinois highschool sports activities administrator Henry “H.V.” Porter.
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He was as Illinois as a horseshoe sandwich. And he liked highschool basketball.
“When the March Insanity is on him, midnight jaunts of 100 miles on successive nights make him much more alert the following day,” Porter wrote romantically of the state’s exuberant highschool basketball followers through the raucous statewide event in March 1939.
It’s the first-known use of a phrase now related to the wildly in style NCAA males’s basketball event — first held, coincidentally, in March 1939, simply as Porter was penning his “March Insanity” essay for “Illinois Excessive Faculty Athlete” journal.
A long time later, the NCAA adopted and trademarked the phrase.
“Porter was a visionary. He was forward of his time.” — Bruce Firchau, The Basketball Museum of Illinois
March Insanity swept over the hardwood courts of small-town Center America lengthy earlier than it emerged from the boardrooms of company America. It’s now a well-recognized catchphrase in wider American tradition past sports activities.
Porter, its creator, had a poet’s soul, an affinity for alliteration and a ardour for heartland highschool hoops.
“He was a visionary. He was forward of his time,” Bruce Firchau, chairman of The Basketball Museum of Illinois, informed Fox Information Digital.
Porter captured the sports activities spirit of small-town America within the Nice Melancholy.
“The annual event of highschool boys basketball groups, sponsored by the Illinois Excessive Faculty Affiliation, grew from a small invitational affair in 1908 to a statewide establishment with over 900 faculties by the late Nineteen Thirties,” the affiliation writes in its on-line historical past.
MARCH MADNESS QUIZ! HOW WELL DO YOU KNOW THE POPULAR NCAA TOURNAMENT?
“In a time earlier than tv, earlier than the faculty recreation grew to become in style with the typical fan, earlier than skilled leagues had established a foothold within the nation’s massive cities, basketball fever had already reached epidemic proportions within the Land of Lincoln.”
Porter did not battle the fever. He helped unfold it.
Born with basketball
Henry Van Arsdale Porter was born in Manito, Illinois, on Oct. 2, 1891.
The sport of basketball was born two months later, in December 1891, created by bodily training instructor Dr. James Naismith on the Springfield, Massachusetts YMCA, now Springfield Faculty.
Porter’s mother and father, Alfred Willis and Laura Beckwith (Hyers) Porter, had been each Illinois natives.
No less than three earlier generations of Porter’s household known as Illinois house. One among his great-grandmothers was from a New Jersey household of pioneers who settled the Midwest.
Porter spent his life working in highschool athletics whereas spreading the gospel of the all-American sport born beside him.
“Tools inventor, rule maker, highschool coach and athletic administrator, Henry Porter’s improvements had been important to the evolution of basketball.” — Basketball Corridor of Fame
“Tools inventor, rule maker, highschool coach and athletic administrator, Henry Porter’s improvements had been important to the evolution of basketball,” says the Naismith Memorial Basketball Corridor of Fame.
“Porter revealed the primary highschool rulebook standardizing the sport throughout the nation,” in 1936, the Corridor provides, and “served as the primary consultant for prime faculties on the Nationwide Basketball Guidelines Committee.”
Porter labored with sports activities producers to supply molded leather-based basketballs to interchange the cumbersome and hard-to-dribble laced balls used within the early years of the game.
“Beneath his management, excessive faculties adopted the brand new ball in 1938, and later within the Nineteen Forties, adopted a fair higher composite-molded basketball,” the Corridor of Fame notes.
His affect unfold nationwide. However Porter’s coronary heart by no means left the small-town courts of Illinois or these fans who liked highschool basketball as a lot as he did.
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“Homo of the Hardwood Courtroom is a hardy specie (sic),” Porter wrote in his influential 1939 essay underneath the headline, “March Insanity.”
His description of basketball followers of the Nice Melancholy nonetheless hits nothing however internet as we speak.
“The thud of the ball on the ground, the slap of the arms on leather-based, the swish of the online are music to his ears … He’s biased, noisy, fidgety, boastful and unreasonable — however we love him for his imperfections.”
Porter left his place as an government with the Illinois Excessive Faculty Affiliation in 1940, the 12 months after he wrote his essay, to turn into government secretary of Nationwide Federation of State Excessive Faculty Associations.
He held the place till 1958, serving to unfold the idea of “March Insanity” to highschool basketball tournaments across the nation.
He adopted up his 1939 “March Insanity” essay with a somber however extra highly effective 1942 poem: “The Basketball Ides of March.”
He wrote it as World Struggle II drew curiosity, and younger males, away from the basketball courts of the American heartland and into the battlefields of Europe and Asia.
“Eagles fly and heroes die/beneath some international arch/let their sons thread the place hate is useless/in a contented Insanity of March.” — H.V. Porter throughout WWII
“In one million lives the place freedom thrives/And liberty lingers nonetheless/How eagles fly and heroes die/beneath some international arch/let their sons thread the place hate is useless/in a contented Insanity of March.”
Land of iron hoops
Broadcaster Brent Musburger helped popularize Porter’s “March Insanity” earlier than a nationwide viewers whereas masking the NCAA event for tv.
He first uttered “March Insanity” on air through the 1982 NCAA event.
The tourney ended that 12 months when an unknown 19-year-old College of North Carolina freshman hit the profitable shot within the championship recreation towards Georgetown.
His title was Michael Jordan.
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Musburger traces the phrase he popularized to Porter and to Illinois, the place he labored as a younger reporter within the Sixties after graduating from Northwestern.
“At the moment, the Illinois highschool basketball tourney was very a lot larger than (NCAA) March Insanity, which had probably not taken off but,” Musburger, now the face of VSiN Community, informed Fox Information Digital in an interview.
“Cities within the Midwest lived for highschool basketball.”
The Illinois highschool event was so large within the Sixties that it spawned a madcap TV advert marketing campaign by a Chicago auto vendor underneath the “March Insanity” banner that included tourney scores from across the state.
“I can’t bear in mind the title of the vendor or the model of autos he was promoting,” Musburger mentioned. “However it was a giant deal in Chicago within the Sixties, particularly with big-city excessive faculties making inroads into the event” — lengthy dominated by small rural faculties.
Small-town March Insanity reached its zenith in Illinois in 1952.
The broadcaster recalled these enthusiastic advertisements and the insanity displayed for Illinois highschool basketball when he started utilizing “March Insanity” to explain the NCAA event.
Small-town March Insanity reached its zenith in Illinois in 1952, when tiny Hebron Excessive Faculty, with a scholar physique of simply 95 youngsters, made all of it the way in which to the state finals in Champaign.
“Hebron grew to become a basketball group years earlier, a very good basketball group,” star of the 1952 group, Phil “Swish” Judson, informed Fox Information Digital.
Amazon and sports activities superstores did not exist again then. So Hebron’s basketball coach years earlier enlisted an area blacksmith to forge hoops from iron in order that Hebron youngsters might cling them from timber or barns and shoot baskets at house.
Swish Judson nonetheless has a type of iron hoops as we speak.
The primitive {hardware} labored. Little Hebron Excessive shocked Illinois basketball by profitable the 1952 state title — toppling mighty Quincy Excessive Faculty. With its scholar physique of 1,400 youngsters, Quincy’s highschool was thrice bigger than your complete city of Hebron.
Hebron’s basketball coach enlisted an area blacksmith to forge hoops from iron in order that Hebron youngsters might cling them from timber or barns and shoot baskets at house.
Judson and his teammates, together with brother Paul, had been feted by what Firchau of The Illinois Basketball Museum known as “the longest parade in Illinois historical past” — he estimates 80 to 100 miles lengthy.
He can nonetheless chronicle the cavalcade city by city: “From Morris to Yorkville, up 47 by Sugar Grove, all the way in which up by Elgin, by Woodstock and across the city sq. twice once they finally obtained to Hebron.”
Years later, the Judson boys had been watching the 1986 film “Hoosiers.”
It is the story of fictional small-town Hickory Excessive Faculty, which miraculously beats a bigger metropolis faculty to win the state title. “Hoosiers” lore says it was impressed by 1954 Indiana state champion Milan Excessive Faculty.
However it struck near house for the 1952 Illinois schoolboy basketball heroes.
Stated Swish Judson, “A whole lot of issues that befell in that movie depicted Hebron.”
Famous Firchau, “Illinois basketball does not take a backseat to anyone, together with Indiana.”
March Insanity retains society on ‘even keel’
Henry Van Arsdale Porter, the person who gave America “March Insanity,” died in St. Petersburg, Forida, on Oct. 27, 1975. He was 84 years previous.
His ashes are interred as we speak at Memorial Park Cemetery in St. Petersburg.
He and his longtime spouse, Grace Kromminga, by no means had kids.
However his spirit lives on within the aggressive zeal of American youth every March.
“A little bit March Insanity could complement and contribute to sanity and assist preserve society on a fair keel.” — H.V. Porter
Porter was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Corridor of Fame as the only real member of its 1960 and second class, largely for contributions outdoors the phrase “March Insanity.”
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The NCAA event, in the meantime, now bearing the title he dropped at life, is an American cultural behemoth.
The faculty athletic affiliation gained the rights to “March Insanity” after a protracted authorized battle with the state of Illinois — the small print of which have by no means been revealed.
“From its humble beginnings to its broadly identified utilization as we speak, the NCAA’s March Insanity trademark represents a precious asset that the NCAA fiercely protects,” wrote mental property legal professional Josh Gerben.
Added Gerben, “Over 85% of the NCAA’s yearly price range comes from the promoting and advertising and marketing of its three-week basketball event. In consequence, the NCAA has a well-established popularity for shielding its ‘March Insanity’ logos, the primary of which was registered again in 1989.”
Porter celebrated healthful youthful pursuits on the hardwood in probably the most tough occasions in American historical past, with the Nice Melancholy lingering for a decade and conflict clouds looming abroad.
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He discovered ardour for basketball important to the well being of the nation in time of disaster.
“A little bit March Insanity,” Porter wrote on the finish of his March 1939 essay, “could complement and contribute to sanity and assist preserve society on a fair keel.”
To learn extra tales on this distinctive “Meet the American Who…” sequence from Fox Information Digital, click on right here.
Illinois
Illinois lands $100M federal grant for EV truck chargers
Public charging for electric trucks — including the largest semi-trailers — is on the way in Illinois.
The state has landed a $100 million federal grant for the construction of 14 public charging stations for medium- and heavy-duty trucks.
Located at strategic points along major truck routes, the charging stations will have a total of 345 ports — enough to charge up to 3,500 trucks a day, according to Illinois electric vehicle officer Megha Lakhchaura.
“Illinois can be a critical connecting node for (electric) trucks going across the county,” said Lakhchaura, noting there is already some charging infrastructure on the East Coast and in the West.
“This would be that critical node that helps trucks actually go across the country, north to south and east to west,” she said.
Charging station locations will include the Chicago area, Springfield, and the Metro East and Quad Cities regions.
Medium- and heavy-duty trucks are responsible for 21% of the country’s transportation-related greenhouse gas emissions, although they account for just 5% of vehicles on the road.
In addition, most of these trucks run on diesel fuel, a growing health concern in neighborhoods such as Little Village, which experience heavy truck traffic.
Exposure to diesel exhaust can lead to asthma and respiratory illnesses and worsen existing heart and lung disease, especially in children and the elderly, according to the Environmental Protection Agency. The agency considers diesel exhaust a likely carcinogen.
At the Chicago-based Respiratory Health Association, Brian Urbaszewski, environmental health programs director, said 14 truck-charging stations is a good start for Illinois.
“It’s really encouraging that the state went for this money, got this money, and is working with businesses to get (the chargers) into the ground,” he said.
Urbaszewski noted that the state also landed a $430 million EPA climate pollution reduction grant in July, of which $115 million will be aimed at truck electrification. And in November, the EPA awarded the state $95 million to electrify transportation and equipment at ports, including the Illinois International Port in the East Side neighborhood.
“This is another piece to a larger puzzle,” Urbaszewski said of the truck-charging grant, “and more funding aimed at things like electrifying trucks.”
Electric trucks remain less than 1% of the medium- and heavy-duty trucks on the road, but sales have been rising.
Lakhchaura said that the future of big electric trucks in Illinois is hard to predict, and a lot is going to depend on the broader market.
“The big problem has been that battery costs haven’t gone down, which is why the long-range (option) hasn’t taken off,” she said.
Medium-duty trucks with ranges of 150 to 160 miles are selling, she said, but for long-distance hauls you need a semi with a range of 500 miles and an attractive price.
Among the companies in the race to produce that truck is Tesla, which has announced plans to begin high-volume production of its semi in late 2025. The Tesla semi has an advertised range of up to 500 miles.
Lakhchaura noted that Tesla’s breakthrough electric cars — the Model 3 and Model Y — changed consumer perceptions of EVs, and she said she’s hoping that a similarly game-changing semi is on the horizon.
In the meantime, she is encouraged by the private sector’s response to Illinois’ grant proposal for the 14 truck charging stations.
Illinois applied for the funds from the U.S. Department of Transportation, but private companies will build the stations and pay some of the cost.
“The state said, ‘Who’s interested in building these chargers?’ and the private sector came, so that gives me a lot of confidence. It’s them coming to us and saying, ‘Yes, we see this (coming),’” she said.
The companies building the charging stations include Tesla, Prologis, Gage Zero and Pilot.
The truck charging stations — some of which will have onsite solar and batteries — should start appearing within two or three years, Lakhchaura said, although that’s a conservative estimate.
“I think (the companies building them) would like to do it sooner,” she said.
nschoenberg@chicagotribune.com
Illinois
How Booked is building a community one stellar reading recommendation at a time
Independent bookstores are the heartbeats of their communities. They provide culture and community, generate local jobs and sales tax revenue, promote literacy and education, champion and center diverse and new authors, connect readers to books in a personal and authentic way, and actively support the right to read and access to books in their communities.
Each week we profile an independent bookstore, sharing what makes each one special and getting their expert and unique book recommendations.
This week we have Booked in Evanston, Illinois!
What’s your store’s story?
Chelsea Elward, a lifelong Evanstonian, opened Booked in 2018 as Chicagoland’s first children’s focused independent bookstore — and the only one with a tiny door just for kids. Today, the store is owned by two employees, Abby Dan and Betsy Haberl.
Recently, we’ve filled the shelves, launched weekly kids’ programming (including two trans and nonbinary Dungeons & Dragons Groups for tweens and teens), expanded the adult section, and added adult book clubs!
Our aim is to be a community space and a community asset, helping Evanston’s families, schools, congregations and businesses connect through books.
What makes your independent bookstore unique?
We’re the store with the tiny door! (Technically, our door is called a “wicket,” but Evanstonians and visitors know that we’ve got a little door within a door just for kids.)
We love to see them confidently (or nervously) striding through our tiny door to find a magical space with books at their level, a cozy rainbow rug, as well as puzzles and toys.
We’re a storytime spot for a fleet of toddler parents and caregivers, thanks to our musically talented and enthusiastic staff. We also host our trans and nonbinary Dungeons & Dragons group, began with four kids and has expanded to a weekly after-hours event for tweens and teens. And as we’ve grown and curated our adult shelves, we’ve built two enthusiastic, committed book clubs: Booked Club (which reads literary fiction and nonfiction) and Sunday Smut (which reads modern romance).
Many community members come in to talk books with us, and we love building these relationships. Most importantly, we are all hand-sellers. You tell us what you need, what you’re feeling, what you want to feel or communicate with a gift, and we can find you the right title.
What’s your favorite section in your store?
I love our Middle Grade section — there is just so much depth there! Middle Grade authors are doing everything from talking dogs to neurodivergent narrators in verse to dragon flights to dust bowl family sagas to elite private schools and everything in between.
I love it when parents or grandparents come in with a great idea of who their kid is but no idea what they should read next. We always have something new or different, and we love it when they come back to tell us we nailed it!
Why is shopping at local, independent bookstores important?
Evanston is everything to Abby and Betsy — we both live here, send our kids to schools here, employ fellow Evanstonians, spend our own money at local businesses.
Booked is a physical place where kids and adults can come to gather and shop, but we’re also a community entity that gets diverse books into classrooms, homes, shelters and other community spaces. We bring authors to the community and its schools, and we bring people of all ages together. Without customers, we can’t add this layer of richness to Evanston, enrich the lives we touch, and we can’t be a cool spot to pick out great stickers. We just won’t be here.
Check out these titles recommended by Booked owner, Abby Dan:
- “The Sentence” by Louise Erdrich
- “Shark Heart” by Emily Habeck
- “Finally Heard” by Kelly Yang
- “The Other Valley” by Scott Alexander Howard
- “Sheine Lende” by Darcie Little Badger
- “Funny Story” by Emily Henry
- “The Birchbark House” by Louise Erdrich
- “Pretty Ugly” by David Sedaris
Illinois
Illinois counties exploring succession would be welcomed in Indiana: House speaker
Several Illinois counties that have explored the idea of secession might be welcomed with open arms in Indiana.
Legislators in Indiana’s Republican-majority General Assembly have introduced a house bill that would establish a commission to discuss whether it’s advisable to adjust the boundary between Illinois and Indiana.
The House Republicans included the bill on a list of their top priorities for the 2025 session, which specifically noted that dozens of counties in Illinois have voted since 2020 “to secede from their high-tax state,” the Indianapolis Star reported.
“To all of our neighbors in the West, we hear your frustrations and invite you to join us in low-cost, low-tax Indiana,” House Speaker Todd Huston said, according to the newspaper.
In the November election, a total of seven counties in Illinois faced a ballot question on exploring the idea of secession, and all seven voted in favor of the proposal, according to county clerks’ offices. The group includes: Iroquois, Calhoun, Clinton, Green, Jersey, Madison and Perry counties.
Prior to the 2024 election cycle, at least two dozen counties voted affirmatively on the non-binding initiatives.
The reasoning behind the referendums, according to supporters, is that the city of Chicago and Cook County have a sizable impact on the policies enacted by the state legislature, and rural counties share different interests that are not being represented by the actions of the General Assembly.
Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker called Indiana’s proposal “a stunt” earlier this week.
“…It’s not going to happen, he said. “But I’ll just that say Indiana is a low-wage state that doesn’t protect workers, a state that does not provide health care for people when they’re in need and so I don’t think it’s very attractive for anybody in Illinois…”
Many legal experts have expressed skepticism that such an effort could ever be successful. That group includes Illinois Attorney General Kwame Raoul, who penned a letter to the state’s attorney of Jersey County on the issue in 2023.
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