The glories of athletic fame did not have to be forgotten after high school in 1916. Bloomington had an extremely active basketball league called the "Commercial League." Teams were sponsored by six different business concerns: Read & Co., Woolworth Co, V Griffin, Coblentz Co., W. Armbruster and the Pantagraph. On this date in 1916 the individual statistics for each player were published in the Pantagraph. Other local teams that formed a league included the Physicians & Dentists, the Country Club, the YMCA Secretaries and the Pastors & Superintendents, among others.
The Commercial League was formed by Captains being assigned to the various sponsors and then an orderly choosing of players from a group of men who had indicated their interest in playing. Unlike the teams based on professions, the Commercial teams were open to any one who wanted to play. Games were played from November to March at the YMCA alongside the church leagues and junior games. Any "unaffiliated" player over the age of 21 was required to play with the Commercial League rather than the junior leagues. Lloyd Eyer, the Physical Director was in charge of making sure the teams were fairly matched across all the league play.
Just one of the men who played in this games was Ralph N "Jack" McCord. His occupation was athletic coach at Bloomington High School, where he set a shot put record as a student in 1906. He received his college education at the University of Illinois where he was a track man. During WWI he was an officer and received training at Ft. Sheridan before he was sent to France to further train officers for the fighting. After the fighting was over he was assigned to organize sports for the men who stayed behind for peacetime work in Europe. In the 20's he moved to California, where he was an official for collegiate football and basketball games.
The high scorer in 1916 was Fred "Brick" Young. Fred Young was an IWU graduate and also a coach at Bloomington High. He remained in Bloomington however, and became sports editor with the Pantagraph for over 50 years. Fred Young was nothing short of a local legend, and I refer you to a piece written by Bill Kemp for the Pantagraph in 2011: http://www.pantagraph.com/news/local/pantagraph-sports-editor-officiated-historic-bears-game/article_9283b46e-2c04-11e0-9b9e-001cc4c03286.html. I could never hope to equal Bill's mastery of sports knowledge and historical research.
Each of these men was seeking the pleasure of athletic competition and physical fitness. Many were not as accomplished as Young or McCord and because the paper assumed that you knew these men, they did not publish their first names in the reports of the Commercial League. After all, you had been at the game that week or the week before and made such community events part of your daily life when televised sports were not available.
Basketball for men was not the only sport pursued in Bloomington. Volleyball was also popular in the winter. Women's leagues were formed for basketball and volleyball as well, which I will have to address in another post.