Joliet Central High School
Encyclopedia
Joliet Central High School is a public secondary school located in Joliet, Illinois. Central is part of Joliet Township High Schools, along with Joliet West
Joliet West High School
Joliet West High School, along with Joliet Central, makes up district 204 Joliet Township High School district in Joliet, Illinois. West's mascot is the Tiger...

 and Joliet East (now defunct). Prior to the opening of Joliet East and West, the school was called Joliet Township High School. In 1993, when Joliet Central and Joliet West combined many of their athletic and other competitive extracurricular programs, the combined program took the old "Joliet Township" name.

In 1982, the school building was placed on the National Register of Historic Places. The building was designed by Frank Shaver Allen
Frank Shaver Allen
Frank Shaver "F.S." Allen was a significant Joliet, Illinois-based architect noted for his Richardsonian Romanesque designs. He designed the Kenosha High School and the English High Gothic Revival Christ Episcopal Church in Joliet, both of which were listed on the National Register of Historic...

.

The school's notable alumni have gone on to careers in varied fields from arts and letters to science and technology.

Building

The school itself is four stories tall, two city blocks long, and includes four separate buildings. The campus underwent a moderate expansion during 2005 when the old shop building was knocked down and a new building was erected in its place. A catwalk now connects the main building to the T&I building and allows students to cross unencumbered during inclement weather. The facilities also include a daycare center (on the ground floor of the Little Theater building), a planetarium, six tennis courts, one soccer field, four baseball fields, a 1/16-mile indoor track and a 1/4-mile track across the street to the east.
There is an historical display on the second floor near the South Entrance that is maintained by the Joliet Central Historical Society. Many archived items are kept in a vault, but the display includes the original Steelman sculpture and conceptual models of it from the 1933 Chicago World's Fair
Century of Progress
A Century of Progress International Exposition was the name of a World's Fair held in Chicago from 1933 to 1934 to celebrate the city's centennial. The theme of the fair was technological innovation...

. The Steelman was sculpted by Louise Lentz Woodruff and is positioned with its hands behind a male and female, symbolizing technology advancing man. It is surrounded by the original relief panels representing the basic sciences: astronomy, mathematics, physics, chemistry, botany, zoology, medicine, and geology. It has long been considered good luck to rub the right knee of the male before any test or sporting events, therefore, the knee has been worn away and reconstituted over the years.

After finishing a new parking lot in 2007, Central began constructing a Field House over the parking lot. In October 2008, the Field House was completed.

Athletics

In sports, the district fields a combined team between Joliet West and Joliet Central, and is collectively known as Joliet Township (the name used when there was only one school in the district). The program is a member of the Southwest Suburban Conference
Southwest Suburban Conference
The Southwest Suburban Conference is an athletic and competitive activity conference consisting of public secondary schools located in the south and southwest suburbs of Chicago, Illinois....

 (SWSC) and is a member of the Illinois High School Association
Illinois High School Association
The Illinois High School Association is one of 521 state high school associations in the United States, designed to regulate competition in most interscholastic sports and some interscholastic activities at the high school level. It is a charter member of the National Federation of State High...

 (IHSA). In this combined form the Steelmen/Steelwomen name which continues to be used by Joliet Central when it competes alone, is used for the combined teams. Joliet Central is the headquarters for the combined athletic program.

The athletic department sponsors interscholastic teams for young men and women in basketball
Basketball
Basketball is a team sport in which two teams of five players try to score points by throwing or "shooting" a ball through the top of a basketball hoop while following a set of rules...

, bowling
Bowling
Bowling Bowling Bowling (1375–1425; late Middle English bowle, variant of boule Bowling (1375–1425; late Middle English bowle, variant of boule...

, cross country
Cross country running
Cross country running is a sport in which people run a race on open-air courses over natural terrain. The course, typically long, may include surfaces of grass and earth, pass through woodlands and open country, and include hills, flat ground and sometimes gravel road...

, golf
Golf
Golf is a precision club and ball sport, in which competing players use many types of clubs to hit balls into a series of holes on a golf course using the fewest number of strokes....

, soccer, swimming & diving
Diving
Diving is the sport of jumping or falling into water from a platform or springboard, sometimes while performing acrobatics. Diving is an internationally-recognized sport that is part of the Olympic Games. In addition, unstructured and non-competitive diving is a recreational pastime.Diving is one...

, tennis
Tennis
Tennis is a sport usually played between two players or between two teams of two players each . Each player uses a racket that is strung to strike a hollow rubber ball covered with felt over a net into the opponent's court. Tennis is an Olympic sport and is played at all levels of society at all...

, track & field, and volleyball
Volleyball
Volleyball is a team sport in which two teams of six players are separated by a net. Each team tries to score points by grounding a ball on the other team's court under organized rules.The complete rules are extensive...

. Young men may compete in baseball
Baseball
Baseball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of nine players each. The aim is to score runs by hitting a thrown ball with a bat and touching a series of four bases arranged at the corners of a ninety-foot diamond...

, football
High school football
High school football, in North America, refers to the game of football as it is played in the United States and Canada. It ranks among the most popular interscholastic sports in both of these nations....

, and wrestling
Scholastic wrestling
Scholastic wrestling, sometimes known in the United States as Folkstyle wrestling, is a style of amateur wrestling practised at the high school and middle school levels in the United States. This wrestling style is essentially Collegiate wrestling with some slight modifications. It is currently...

, while young women may compete in badminton
Badminton
Badminton is a racquet sport played by either two opposing players or two opposing pairs , who take positions on opposite halves of a rectangular court that is divided by a net. Players score points by striking a shuttlecock with their racquet so that it passes over the net and lands in their...

, cheerleading
Cheerleading
Cheerleading is a physical activity, sometimes a competitive sport, based on organized routines, usually ranging from one to three minutes, which contain the components of tumbling, dance, jumps, cheers, and stunting to direct spectators of events to cheer on sports teams at games or to participate...

, and softball
Softball
Softball is a bat-and-ball sport played between two teams of 10 to 14 players. It is a direct descendant of baseball although there are some key differences: softballs are larger than baseballs, and the pitches are thrown underhand rather than overhand...

. While not sponsored by the IHSA, the school also sponsors a poms team.

The following teams finished in the top four of their respective IHSA sponsored state championship tournament:
  • Baseball: 2nd place (1974–75)
  • Basketball (boys): 4th place (1994–95); 3rd place (1969–70); State Champions (1936–37)
  • Golf (boys): 2nd place (1951–52)
  • Softball: State Champions (1999–2000)
  • Track & Field (boys): 4th place (1905–06, 14–15); 2nd place (1931–32); State Champions (1915–16)
  • Track & Field (girls): 4th place (1993–94)
  • Wrestling: 4th place (1946–47, 47–48); 2nd place (1985–86); State Champions (1984–85)


During the 2008 - 2009 school year, Central and West began to separate their football programs, causing the West mascot to become the Tiger once again, leaving Central as the Steelmen. The split began with Joliet's Freshmen football team dividing. By the 2010 - 2011 school year, Joliet Central and Joliet West will have their own football teams. It is still unknown if other sports and activities between both schools will divide.

Notable alumni

  • Jesse Barfield
    Jesse Barfield
    Jesse Lee Barfield is a former Major League Baseball right fielder who played for the Toronto Blue Jays and New York Yankees . He batted and threw right-handed. He lived in Tenafly, a suburb of New York City.Barfield was well known for his powerful, accurate throwing arm...

     (1977) is a former Major League Baseball
    Major League Baseball
    Major League Baseball is the highest level of professional baseball in the United States and Canada, consisting of teams that play in the National League and the American League...

     outfielder
    Outfielder
    Outfielder is a generic term applied to each of the people playing in the three defensive positions in baseball farthest from the batter. These defenders are the left fielder, the center fielder, and the right fielder...

     (1981–92), playing most of his career with the Toronto Blue Jays
    Toronto Blue Jays
    The Toronto Blue Jays are a professional baseball team located in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. The Blue Jays are a member of the Eastern Division of Major League Baseball 's American League ....

    . He won two Gold Gloves
    Rawlings Gold Glove Award
    The Rawlings Gold Glove Award, usually referred to as the Gold Glove, is the award given annually to the Major League Baseball players judged to have exhibited superior individual fielding performances at each fielding position in both the National League and the American League , as voted by the...

     and one Silver Slugger.
  • Lois Delander
    Lois Delander
    Lois Eleanor Delander was Miss America in 1927.Delander, a native of Joliet, Illinois and high school junior, aged 16, won the crown on her parents' twentieth wedding anniversary. The pageant was not held again until 1932. She died near Chicago in 1985.- References :...

     (1931) was, while a student at the school, the first woman to win the Miss Illinois
    Miss Illinois
    The Miss Illinois competition is the pageant that selects the representative for the state of Illinois in the Miss America pageant. The Miss Illinois pageant started in 1927, several years after the initial Miss America pageant. The first "Miss Illinois" sent to the national pageant, Lois Delander,...

     pageant, and then became Miss America
    Miss America
    The Miss America pageant is a long-standing competition which awards scholarships to young women from the 50 states plus the District of Columbia, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands...

     1927.
  • Katherine Dunham
    Katherine Dunham
    Katherine Mary Dunham was an American dancer, choreographer, songwriter, author, educator, and activist...

     (1926) was a dancer, choreographer, civil rights activist, teacher, and anthropologist who was a pioneer in African-American modern dance, dance ethnology. In 1983, she was awarded with a Kennedy Center Honor
    Kennedy Center Honors
    The Kennedy Center Honors is an annual honor given to those in the performing arts for their lifetime of contributions to American culture. The Honors have been presented annually since 1978 in Washington, D.C., during gala weekend-long events which culminate in a performance for—and...

    .
  • Merritt Giffin
    Merritt Giffin
    Merritt Giffin was an American athlete who competed mainly in the discus throw....

     (1908) was an athlete who won a silver medal in the men's discus throw at the 1908 Summer Olympics
    1908 Summer Olympics
    The 1908 Summer Olympics, officially the Games of the IV Olympiad, were an international multi-sport event which was held in 1908 in London, England, United Kingdom. These games were originally scheduled to be held in Rome. At the time they were the fifth modern Olympic games...

    .
  • John D. Goeken
    John D. Goeken
    John D. "Jack" Goeken was a prolific telecommunications entrepreneur. He was the original founder of Microwave Communications Inc., better known as MCI Inc.-Founding of MCI:...

     is a telecommunications entrepreneur who founded MCI Inc.
    MCI Inc.
    MCI, Inc. is an American telecommunications subsidiary of Verizon Communications that is headquartered in Ashburn, Virginia...

    , FTD
    FTD
    FTD may refer to:* Field test display, a software application on mobile phones* Financial Times Deutschland, a German language financial newspaper based in Hamburg, Germany, published by Gruner + Jahr...

    's FTD Mercury Network, Airfone
    Airfone
    Airfone is a brand of air-ground radiotelephone service offered by Verizon. Airfone allows passengers to make telephone calls in-flight. It was originated by John D. Goeken in the 1970s. Western Union purchased a fifty percent share in Airfone in 1981 and sold to GTE in 1986 for $39 million cash...

    , and In-Flight Phone Corporation  His lawsuit against AT&T
    AT&T
    AT&T Inc. is an American multinational telecommunications corporation headquartered in Whitacre Tower, Dallas, Texas, United States. It is the largest provider of mobile telephony and fixed telephony in the United States, and is also a provider of broadband and subscription television services...

     eventually led to its divestiture of its Bell company holdings.
  • Kathryn Hays
    Kathryn Hays
    Kathryn Hays is an American actress. She was born in Princeton, Illinois and grew up in Joliet, Illinois.In the 1966-1967 television season, Hays appeared as Elizabeth Reynolds Pride in the NBC western series The Road West, with co-stars Barry Sullivan, Andrew Prine, Kelly Corcoran, and Glenn...

     (1952) is an actress, perhaps best known for her role as Kim Sullivan Hughes
    Kim Sullivan Hughes
    Kimberly "Kim" Hughes was a fictional character on the CBS soap opera As the World Turns. The character was portrayed by Kathryn Hays continuously from 1972...

     on the soap opera
    Soap opera
    A soap opera, sometimes called "soap" for short, is an ongoing, episodic work of dramatic fiction presented in serial format on radio or as television programming. The name soap opera stems from the original dramatic serials broadcast on radio that had soap manufacturers, such as Procter & Gamble,...

     As the World Turns
    As the World Turns
    As the World Turns is an American television soap opera that aired on CBS from April 2, 1956 to September 17, 2010. Irna Phillips created As the World Turns as a sister show to her other soap opera Guiding Light...

    (1972–2010).
  • John Houbolt
    John Houbolt
    John Cornelius Houbolt is a retired aerospace engineer. He is generally credited with having effectively promoted the lunar mission mode called Lunar Orbit Rendezvous or LOR. This flight path was first endorsed by Wernher von Braun in June 1961 and was chosen for Apollo program in early 1962...

     (1936) is a former aerospace engineer
    Aerospace engineering
    Aerospace engineering is the primary branch of engineering concerned with the design, construction and science of aircraft and spacecraft. It is divided into two major and overlapping branches: aeronautical engineering and astronautical engineering...

     who fought for and developed the Lunar Orbit Rendezvous
    Lunar orbit rendezvous
    Lunar orbit rendezvous is a key concept for human landing on the Moon and returning to Earth.In a LOR mission a main spacecraft and a smaller lunar module travel together into lunar orbit. The lunar module then independently descends to the lunar surface. After completion of the mission there, a...

     (LOR) plan for transporting astronauts to and from the moon.
  • Mort Kondracke
    Mort Kondracke
    Morton M. Kondracke is an American political commentator and journalist. He gained great visibility via a long stint as a panelist on The McLaughlin Group. Kondracke worked for several leading publications, serving for twenty years as executive editor and columnist for the non-partisan Capitol...

     (1956) is a political journalist who has written independently, and for such periodicals as Roll Call
    Roll Call
    Roll Call is a newspaper published in Washington, D.C., United States, from Monday to Thursday when the United States Congress is in session and on Mondays only during recess. Roll Call reports news of legislative and political maneuverings on Capitol Hill, as well as political coverage of...

    . He is also known for his long running appearance as a regular panelist on The McLaughlin Group
    The McLaughlin Group
    The McLaughlin Group is a syndicated half-hour weekly public affairs television program in the United States, where a group of five pundits discuss current political issues in a round table format. It has been broadcast since 1982, and is currently sponsored by MetLife...

    .
  • Harry Daniel Leinenweber
    Harry Daniel Leinenweber
    Harry Daniel Leinenweber is a United States federal judge.Born in Joliet, Illinois, Leinenweber received a B.A. from the University of Notre Dame in 1959 and a J.D. from the University of Chicago Law School in 1962. He was in private practice in Joliet, Illinois from 1962 to 1986. He was a City...

     is a U.S. federal judge
    United States federal judge
    In the United States, the title of federal judge usually means a judge appointed by the President of the United States and confirmed by the United States Senate in accordance with Article II of the United States Constitution....

     (1985–present) serving on the bench of the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois
    United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois
    The United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois is the trial-level court with jurisdiction over the northern counties of Illinois....

    .
  • Phyllis Reynolds Naylor
    Phyllis Reynolds Naylor
    Phyllis Reynolds Naylor is an American author best known for her children and young adult fiction books. Naylor is best known for her children's-novel trilogy Shiloh , Shiloh Season and Saving Shiloh, all made into movies...

     (1951) is an award winning author of children's and young adult literature (Shiloh, the Alice
    Alice series
    The Alice series is a [book series] written by [Phyllis Reynolds Naylor]. There are three prequels to this series. The first one, Starting with Alice, describes Alice in third grade. Alice in Blunder land is Alice in fourth grade. The final prequel, Lovingly Alice, follows Alice through the...

    series, The Witch Saga
    The Witch Saga
    The Witch Saga is a 6-part fantasy novel series by author Phyllis Reynolds Naylor. The books deal with supernatural forces, specifically; witchcraft. Witch's Sister, the first book in the series, was adapted into an episode of the television series, Big Blue Marble.-Characters:*Lynn Morley is an...

    ).
  • Robert Novak
    Robert Novak
    Robert David Sanders "Bob" Novak was an American syndicated columnist, journalist, television personality, author, and conservative political commentator. After working for two newspapers before serving for the U.S. Army in the Korean War, he became a reporter for the Associated Press and then for...

     (1948) was a political journalist, writer, and television personality. He was known for his long writing and television relationship with Rowland Evans
    Rowland Evans
    Rowland Evans, Jr. was an American journalist. He was known best for his decades-long syndicated column and television partnership with Robert Novak, a partnership that endured, if only by way of a joint subscription newsletter, until Evans's death.Born in Whitemarsh Township, Pennsylvania, Evans...

     (Evans, Novak, Hunt & Shields
    Evans, Novak, Hunt & Shields
    Evans, Novak, Hunt & Shields was an interview/political discussion show on CNN for approximately 20 years hosted by Rowland Evans and Robert Novak. The weekly program featured four rotating panelists, including Evans, Novak, Al Hunt and Mark Shields....

    ).
  • Lionel Richie
    Lionel Richie
    Lionel Brockman Richie, Jr. , is an American singer-songwriter, musician and record producer. Since 1968, he has been a member of the musical group Commodores signed to Motown Records...

     (attended) is an award winning singer, songwriter, and record producer who was a member of the Commodores
    Commodores
    The Commodores are an American funk/soul band of the 1970s and 1980s. The members of the group met as mostly freshmen at Tuskegee Institute in 1968, and signed with Motown in November 1972, having first caught the public eye opening for The Jackson 5 while on tour...

     before starting a solo career. (All Night Long (All Night)
    All Night Long (All Night)
    "All Night Long " is a hit single for Lionel Richie from 1983. Taken from his second solo album, Can't Slow Down, it combined Richie's soulful Commodores style with Caribbean influences. This new, more dance approach proved popular, as the single reached number one on three Billboard charts...

    , Say You, Say Me
    Say You, Say Me
    "Say You, Say Me" is a Oscar winning song, written and recorded by Lionel Richie for the film White Nights, starring Mikhail Baryshnikov and Gregory Hines. The single hit number one on the Billboard Hot 100 and R&B singles charts in December 1985. It became Richie's ninth number one on the...

    , Hello
    Hello (Lionel Richie song)
    "Hello" is a song by Lionel Richie. Taken as the third single from Richie's multi-platinum album Can't Slow Down, the song was released in 1984 and reached number one on three Billboard music charts: the pop chart , the R&B chart , and the adult contemporary chart . The song also went to number one...

    ); he graduated from Joliet East in 1967.
  • Larry Parks
    Larry Parks
    Larry Parks was an American stage and movie actor. He was born Samuel Klausman Lawrence Parks. His career was virtually ended when he admitted to having once been a member of a Communist party cell, which led to his blacklisting by all Hollywood studios.-Background:Parks grew up in Joliet,...

     (1932) was an Academy Award nominated actor (The Jolson Story
    The Jolson Story
    The Jolson Story is a 1946 musical biography which purports to tell the life story of singer Al Jolson. It stars Larry Parks as Jolson, Evelyn Keyes as "Julie Benson" , William Demarest as his manager, Ludwig Donath and Tamara Shayne as his parents, and Scotty Beckett as the young Jolson.The...

    ). He testified before the House Un-American Activities Committee
    House Un-American Activities Committee
    The House Committee on Un-American Activities or House Un-American Activities Committee was an investigative committee of the United States House of Representatives. In 1969, the House changed the committee's name to "House Committee on Internal Security"...

    , and was blacklisted in Hollywood
    Hollywood blacklist
    The Hollywood blacklist—as the broader entertainment industry blacklist is generally known—was the mid-twentieth-century list of screenwriters, actors, directors, musicians, and other U.S. entertainment professionals who were denied employment in the field because of their political beliefs or...

     as a consequence.
  • George E. Sangmeister
    George E. Sangmeister
    George Edward Sangmeister was a former member of the United States House of Representatives. He originally represented Illinois' 4th District, before it was renumbered as the 11th district....

     was a U.S. Representative
    United States House of Representatives
    The United States House of Representatives is one of the two Houses of the United States Congress, the bicameral legislature which also includes the Senate.The composition and powers of the House are established in Article One of the Constitution...

     (1989–95).
  • Trina Shoemaker
    Trina Shoemaker
    Trina Shoemaker is a mixer, record producer and sound engineer responsible for producing/engineering and/or mixing records for popular bands such as Queens of the Stone Age, Sheryl Crow, Emmylou Harris, Something for Kate, Nanci Griffith and many more....

     (1983) is a 3–time Grammy Award
    Grammy Award
    A Grammy Award — or Grammy — is an accolade by the National Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences of the United States to recognize outstanding achievement in the music industry...

     winning record producer
    Record producer
    A record producer is an individual working within the music industry, whose job is to oversee and manage the recording of an artist's music...

     and sound engineer.
  • James J. Stukel
    James J. Stukel
    James J. Stukel served as the 15th President of the University of Illinois.-Early life:James Stukel was born on March 30, 1937 in Joliet, Illinois to Philip and Julia Stukel. James and his sole sibling, a sister 13 years older than he was, had a modest upbringing. His father, a pulp mill worker,...

     (1955) was the 15th president of the University of Illinois
    University of Illinois system
    The University of Illinois is a system of public universities in Illinois consisting of three campuses: Urbana-Champaign, Chicago, and Springfield. Across its three campuses, the University of Illinois enrolls about 70,000 students. It had an operating budget of $4.17 billion in 2007.-System:The...

    .
  • Edwin Way Teale
    Edwin Way Teale
    Edwin Way Teale was an American naturalist, photographer, and Pulitzer Prize-winning writer. Teale's works serve as primary source material documenting environmental conditions across North America from 1930 - 1980...

     (1918) was a naturalist
    Naturalist
    Naturalist may refer to:* Practitioner of natural history* Conservationist* Advocate of naturalism * Naturalist , autobiography-See also:* The American Naturalist, periodical* Naturalism...

    , journalist, and writer. He won the 1966 Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction
    Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction
    The Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction has been awarded since 1962 for a distinguished book of non-fiction by an American author that is not eligible for consideration in another category.-1960s:...

     for the book Wandering Through Winter
    Wandering Through Winter
    Wandering Through Winter: A Naturalist's Record of a 20,000-Mile Journey Through the North American Winter is a non-fiction book written by Edwin Way Teale, published in 1965 by Dodd, Mead and Company, and winner of the 1966 Pulitzer Prize for General Non-Fiction...

    .
  • Lynne Thigpen
    Lynne Thigpen
    Cherlynne Theresa “Lynne” Thigpen was an American stage and television actress, most famous as "The Chief" in the various Carmen Sandiego television series.-Early life:...

     (1966) was an actress with credits on film (Bicentennial Man), television (Where in the World is Carmen Sandiego?), and stage. She won a Tony Award in 1997 for her role in the play An American Daughter
    An American Daughter
    An American Daughter is a play written by Wendy Wasserstein. The play takes place in a living room in Georgetown, Washington, D.C.-Production history:...

    .
  • Jermaine Stegall (1995) Award Winning Movie/Television Composer.
  • Audrey Totter
    Audrey Totter
    Audrey Mary Totter is an American actress and former Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer contract star of Austrian-Slovene and Swedish descent...

    , 1936

External links

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