Friends of Basketball

Charles W. Whitten

Year Inducted: 1974

Category: Friends of Basketball

Schools / Organizations: IHSA

Biography: Mr. Charles Whitten was the first executive secretary of the IHSA and served in this capacity from 1922 to 1942.  He was the first full time executive secretary of any state association in the United States.  Mr. Whitten has often been compared to Judge Kennesaw Mountain Landis for the way he put the IHSA on such solid footing.  A great number of the many sound principles and policies which today guide the course of interscholastic competition in the state and the nation bear the stamp of Mr. Whitten’s clear-cut thinking and positive ideas.  Sadly, Mr. Whitten passed away in 1957 but not before making his mark in Illinois basketball history.