Press Release for Illustrious

For immediate release.
The book “Illustrious: The Best High School Basketball Gyms in Illinois”
by photojournalist Vincent D. Johnson

*Potential cover for the book “Illustrious.” It may change before printing.*

Four years in the making, Illustrious is poised to be one of the most popular books about Illinois high school sports ever!

For decades fans of high school basketball in Illinois have argued amongst themselves about which high school has “the best gym” in the state. For a state that spans 385-miles north to south, with over 800 high schools, answering that question unequivocally however would be a Herculean feat few have tried and no one had taken photos of to share. Until now!

Facts about the book

Beyond basketball; Stories of America

Who is this book for?

About Vincent D. Johnson

About Michael O’Brien

What schools are included?

Facts about the book

Hard cover book with dust jacket
Book size: 11.5 x 10 inches
264 pages
Over 400 full-color photos
Printed on firm (105#) paper
Featuring 126 different gyms from 120 different high schools
Book author & photographer, Vincent D. Johnson
Foreword by Michael O’Brien of the Chicago Sun-Times
Retail price $29.95

Beyond basketball; Stories of America

While this book doesn’t give a definitive “best gym,” it makes every effort to show the different styles, decorations, and history of the gyms, the schools, and the people who helped shaped them. Above all though it has photographs from award winning photojournalist Vincent D. Johnson that were taken specifically for this book.

Part art, encyclopedia, & history book all wrapped into one. Illustrious is as much a documentary on the architecture of these great halls communities built to showcase their next generation of adults, as it is a telling of Americana and the every day struggles and triumphs of small towns, suburban areas, and cities.

Along side the over-400 photographs are stories of how the gyms came to be. Some were built as part of the Works Progress Administration, others originally had military uses. More than a few gyms are only still here because rural towns saw population declines. Where schools did the opposite of outgrowing their spaces, and combined with a neighboring school in one of the buildings. At least two schools in the book were hit by a tornado and one was used as a refuge for a town that lost its school to a tornado.

While many gyms were named after coaches & school district superintendents, the book looks at a school that named their gym after a student athlete whose life was tragically cut short his senior season. Another gym is named after a local grad who spent over 50 years doing everything at the school from painting fences to working the scorer’s table.

More than a few gyms were behind the wrecking ball before the book went to print. Others are soon to be replaced or relegated to auxiliary status.

Who is this book for?

History buffs, sports fans, high school graduates of the schools, photography lovers, architecture fans, and any one who has local and state pride.

About photojournalist Vincent D. Johnson

Having traveled around on assignments for various newspapers since the mid-1990, photojournalist Vincent D. Johnson has seen his share of high school gyms. The idea of doing a project on the state’s more unique gyms first arose in 2012 after covering a girls-basketball game at Oak Park-River Forest. With one toddler and another child on the way, Johnson put a pin in the idea. However coming out of the pandemic his interest was once again sparked while covering basketball at Brother Rice High School in Chicago. This started a long photographic and research journey in late 2021.

Johnson traveled Illinois as far as the banks of the Ohio River on the state’s southern border and as close as across the street from his home to photograph gyms. He traversed dense city neighborhoods with schools on the National Register of Historic Places (Chicago Military Academy-Bronzeville.) Down country roads where a local mayor helped him crawl through a hole in a wall to see inside a former segregated high school (Colp.) Parked his car on a ferry barge to get to a part of the state you couldn’t end up in even if you were lost (Brussels.) From high schools with barely 50 students (Greenview) to what is often one of the state’s highest enrolled high schools (Lane Tech.) He made sure to see them all.

Johnson would talk with fellow sports journalists, coaches, athletic directors, former players, and fans of high school basketball to find schools big and small that had gyms that weren’t “stale rectangles.” Armed with a spreadsheet of all of the over 800 high schools in Illinois, he meticulously searched for photos & video of them all before dwindling down to a list about 250 gyms he needed to visit.

His research led him to the first high school to ever have its own basketball team (Morgan Park Academy.) To examine the work of architects Ralph Legeman and Dwight Perkins. Along the way he was taken through back-hallways, closed doors, and defunct schools to see old gyms that were rarely used. There were first person accounts of glory days and disasters. With schools who rarely won a regional, to schools with multiple state titles, all getting the same attention to detail if their gymnasium was unique.

Now all those gyms are brought to tables around the state in one 264-page book so people can make their own decisions about which gym reins supreme. Without having to put thousand of miles on their odometer.

About the Chicago Sun-Times high school sports reporter Michael O’Brien

Michael O’Brien has been a high school sports reporter at the Chicago Sun-Times for over two decades. He is currently and has been for some time, the lead high school sports reporter at the paper.

What schools are included?

Everybody is dying to know what schools are included in the book and how I rank them.

While I’ll be keeping my personal rankings to random posts on social media and not one complete list. I will include all the schools in the book and a “x2” or “x3” if they have more than one gym featured. However, there are a select few gyms in the book that I’m keeping a secret.

The list in alphabetical order