PEORIA — Former Metamora swimmer Anna Peplowski was named to the U.S. Olympic women’s swim team on Saturday night at the U.S. Olympic Trials in Indianapolis.
She joined a list of athletes born in the Peoria area or with Peoria ties who’ve reached the Olympics going back nearly 130 years, procured mostly from the online database Olympedia. If you know of additional Olympians with ties to the Peoria area, please email us at sports@pjstar.com.
Which Peoria athletes were in the Olympics?
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Anna Peplowski of Germantown Hills, who swam for Metamora in high school, qualified for the 2024 Olympics as part of Team USA’s women’s 4×200-meter freestyle relay.
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Katie McLaughlin made the U.S. women’s team for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics (staged in 2021 because of COVID delays). She is the daughter of Spalding graduate James McLaughlin and uncles Kevin, Dan and Mike, all of whom grew up in Peoria.
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Peoria High School grad and figure skater Matt Savoie finished seventh in the 2006 Turin Olympics. Savoie also went to the Olympics, as an alternate, in 2002.
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East Peoria graduate Tim Broe ran for the U.S. men’s team in the 2004 Summer Olympics.
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Amanda Adkins was born in Peoria and swam for the U.S. women’s team in the 2000 Sydney Olympics.
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Manual High School grad Carla McGhee won gold with the U.S. women’s basketball team in the 1996 Atlanta Olympics.
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Former Bradley player Marcel DeSouza played for the Brazil men’s basketball team in four Olympics, from 1980-92.
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Bradley graduate Hersey Hawkins, who played 13 seasons in the NBA, won men’s basketball bronze for Team USA in 1988.
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Limestone graduate Mike Dunne, who went on to play at Bradley before an MLB career, pitched for Team USA in the 1984 Olympics.
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Woodruff graduate Charlotte Lewis, who played at Illinois State and professionally, won a silver medal with the U.S. women’s basketball team in the 1976 Olympics.
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Ron Zinn was born in Peoria and competed in the 20-kilometer race-walk at the 1960 and 1964 Olympics. A decorated Army officer, he was killed in action Ho Chi Minh City during the Vietnam War in 1965.
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Teri Montefusco-Miller was born in Peoria went on to work at Proctor Hospital and in between was on the U.S. women’s gymnastics team at the 1960 Olympics.
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The 1952 gold medal U.S. men’s basketball team included five players from the Peoria Caterpillars AAU basketball team based in Peoria: Ron Bontemps of Morton, Marc Freiberger, Frank McCabe of Peoria, Dan Pippin and Howie Williams.
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Don Piper was born in Peoria and played for the U.S. basketball team that won the gold medal in the 1936 Olympics.
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Illinois native Lambert “Pat” Redd was a Bradley athlete who won a silver medal in the long jump during the 1936 Olympics.
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Harold Osborn, an agriculture teacher at Lewistown High School, went to the 1924 Olympics — 100 years ago and also in Paris — and won two gold medals.
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Walter Dray was born in Peoria and set world records in the pole vault in the 1904 and 1908 Olympics.
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Orin Upshaw was born in Peoria and was part of the U.S. tug-of-war team that won a silver medal at the 1904 Olympics.
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Herb Jamison was born in Peoria, ran a business here for most of his life, and ran the 400 sprint in 1896 Summer Olympics in Athens.
Dave Eminian is the Journal Star sports columnist, and covers Bradley men’s basketball, the Rivermen and Chiefs. He writes the Cleve In The Eve sports column for pjstar.com. He can be reached at 686-3206 or deminian@pjstar.com. Follow him on X.com @icetimecleve.
This article originally appeared on Journal Star: List of Olympic athletes from around Peoria, Illinois
