George G. Evans
For quite a number of years the Northern Illinois State Teachers College at DeKalb, Illinois, has been turning out athletes who have made competitive events more than interesting for competing teams. Much of this credit goes to George "Chick" Evans, former coach and now Director of Athletics. The DeKalb mentor seems to have a sixth sense for detecting hidden talent and an extraordinary ability for developing that talent, but Chick Evans would be the last man to admit this.
George was born in El Paso on June 18, 1900, and after living for a time in Peoria with his parents, he moved back to El Paso and attended school here from the fifth grade through his junior year in high school. He recalls playing shinny with an old tin can and sticks cut from trees in the year 1912, when Teddy Roosevelt ran for president on the Bull Moose ticket. The kids picked political names for their opposing sides, and Evans says there were many bruised and bloodied shins as a result of those frantic games.