PEORIA MAGAZINE April 2022

RICHARD A. WHITING (NOV. 12, 1891 – FEB. 19, 1938)

RichardWhitingwas born into amusical family. His father, FrankWhiting, was a realty agent and gifted violinist, while his mother, Blossom Whiting, was a piano teacher. After graduating from high school in Los Angeles, Richard Whiting went into vaudeville, then turned to songwriting, churning out pop hits during the earliest days of recorded music. Though contemporaries such as Irving Berlin created relatively complex arrangements inf luenced by jazz, Whiting opted for a simpler style that often seemed catchier to the average listener. His hits included the standards “Hooray for Hollywood,” “Ain’t We Got Fun” and “On the Good Ship Lollipop.” In 1936, he was nominated for an Oscar for Best Original Song with “When Did You Leave Heaven?” from the movie “Sing, Baby, Sing.” He was inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame as part of its inaugural class, in 1970. GEORGE D. SAX (APRIL 14, 1904 – MARCH 12, 1974) Sax did odd jobs to put himself through Brown’s Business College, later Midstate College, and eventually went into banking. In 1944, he bought a controlling interest inHalstedExchange

P E O R I A R E T R O

FROM PEORIA TO PROMINENCE

BY PHIL LUCIANO

C entral Illinois can boast key contributions to revolutionary innovations. A list of inventors could be topped by the Duryea brothers, the first Americans to design, produce and market a gasoline-powered automobile. Developments here would be highlighted by the mass production of penicillin, which helped winWorldWar II and radically improve modern medicine. But there are others who made important contributions to their fields. The following is a list of Peoria-born visionaries whose names probably don’t ring a bell, but their work changed the world in ways big and small.

52 APRIL 2022 PEORIA MAGAZINE