Published on November 1 2018 3:55 pm
Last Updated on November 1 2018 3:56 pm
The nation’s first African-American president heads the list of minority trailblazers selected in the Illinois Top 200 project, followed by two Native American rivals, a Chicago mayor and a groundbreaking diplomat and cabinet secretary.
Barack Obama, who rose from community organizer to senator to president during his time in Illinois, was the top pick in online voting conducted as part of the celebration of the state’s 200thbirthday.
He was followed by Black Hawk, the Sauk warrior who fought American expansion into Illinois, and Chief Keokuk, a rival who gave up land to avoid bloodshed as settlers arrived.
The top five also includes Harold Washington, Chicago’s first African-American mayor, and Patricia Roberts Harris, the first African-American woman to become an ambassador or serve in a presidential cabinet.
"This list reminds us that Illinois would not be what it is today without hard work and sacrifice by people of all races, religions and orientations,” said Governor Bruce Rauner. “We should all be grateful for the trailblazers honored here by voters in the Illinois Top 200 project."
The Top 200 project lets Illinoisans vote every two weeks on the state’s most inspiring leaders, greatest inventions, top businesses and much more. By the state’s bicentennial on Dec. 3, voters will have chosen 10 favorites in 20 different categories – the Illinois Top 200.
Voting in the next category, top leaders, is underway at www.IllinoisTop200.com. The nominees include Abraham Lincoln, Ronald Reagan, Jane Addams and Ida B Wells.
Here are the top 10 “minority trailblazers” chosen in online voting:
“Everyone in Illinois can take pride in the men and women on this list. In different ways and different eras, they stood up for their beliefs, put their talents to work and tried to make the world a better place,” said Alan Lowe, executive director of the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum. “President Lincoln wanted to expand ‘the family of freedom.’ Barack Obama reaching the White House was a tremendous step in fulfilling Lincoln’s vision.”
The nominees who did not make the top 10 were Claude Barnett, founder of the Associated Negro Press; Roland Burris, the first African-American to hold statewide office in Illinois; African-American congressman Oscar Stanton De Priest; gay-rights pioneer Henry Gerber; John Jones, the first African-American elected to political office in Illinois; Black Panther leader Fred Hampton; economist Abram Lincoln Harris Jr.; football player Joe Lillard; Larry McKeon, the first openly gay Illinois legislator; “Free” Frank McWorter, the former slave who founded a town; Carlos Montezuma, the first Native American man to get a medical degree; early Japanese immigrant Michitaro Ongawa; and John W. E. Thomas, the first African-American elected to the Illinois legislature.
The Illinois Top 200 is a joint initiative of the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum, The (Springfield) State Journal-Register and the Illinois Bicentennial Commission.