Elgin Hall of Fame welcomes new class

The Elgin Sports Hall of Fame Foundation held its 34th annual induction ceremony and banquet Sunday night at The Centre of Elgin, inducting five new members into the Hall of Fame, awarding $25,000 in scholarships to local student-athletes, and recognizing more than 50 Outstanding Achievement Award winners.

“It was a special night again,” said foundation President Ron Lange, a 1968 Larkin graduate. “The mission of the foundation is to induct, recognize and award scholarships and our annual banquet is the culmination of a year’s work at those endeavors.”

The inductees — Anton Kossakowski (Larkin High School), Alan Lettow (Larkin), Jeff Myers (friend of sports), Dave Russell (Elgin High School) and Vince Webber (Larkin) — bring the total of Hall of Fame inductees to 158 since the hall’s inception in 1980.

Beginning with one $500 scholarship in 1980, the foundation has now awarded over $353,000 in scholarship money to student-athletes who attended Elgin high schools or live in Elgin. This year, twenty-five $1,000 scholarships were presented.

Outstanding Achievement Awards were presented to more than 50 high school, youth and adult athletes and coaches for their accomplishments over the past year.

Former longtime youth baseball and football coach Mike Bailey was recognized with the Vic Masi Award, which is presented annually to an individual for his or her volunteer contributions to sports in Elgin.