DU PAGE COUNTY’S FIVE GREATS

Most rural or suburban counties in the United States do not have even one citizen who has become a long established national leader in an important field of endeavor.

DuPage County has had five persons who have moved to the top of their profession nationally and have had a permanent and positive impact upon an important facet of American life.

These remarkable persons who during important years in their lives have been DuPage County citizens are:

Elbert H. Gary who gave the American steel industry much of its present shape and who founded the United States Steel Corporation, the nation’s first billion dollar enterprise.

John W. Gates (Bet-a-Million) the only individual among the great turn-of-the-century nation builders who figured prominently in upgrading the potential of both the nation’s agriculture and its industry.

Robert R. McCormick, editor, publisher and principal owner of the Chicago Tribune, who was the nation’s leading newspaper publisher for a quarter of a century.

Harold (Red) Grange, the Wheaton Ice Man and the nation’s most illustrious football player, whose career has set the pattern for today’s professional team sports ... football, basketball and even baseball.

Billy Graham whose evangelistic career is based on every continent and has made him the world’s best-known and most beloved Christian.

Two of them, Red Grange and Billy Graham, are still living. Dr. Graham’s already unprecedented evangelistic career is still unfolding.

How could it be that one geographically small Illinois county could have such an unusual association? The specific way in which DuPage County is constituted explains the connection with two of them. The close proximity to Chicago molded the careers of Gary and McCormick. The fact that Wheaton College is in DuPage County explains another ... Billy Graham.

For the other two, Gates and Grange, there is no explanation other than the fact that they grew up in DuPage. They would have unquestionably become the national leaders doing what they did regardless of where they spent their boyhood.

Another factor that sets these five apart from all other DuPage citizens is that they were famous for long periods of time. This means that they had to meet the responsibilities and endure the tensions of being famous and still emerge as great human beings. DuPage has had a number of national and even international leaders who were never so well known as to have to tailor their lives to meet the strain of constant public recognition.