Pete Vonachen, the guiding spirit behind the Peoria Chiefs (Low Class A; Midwest League) since 1983, passed away yesterday at the age of 87.
Vonachen was already an important member of the Peoria community when he bought the then-Peoria Suns in 1983; he was a high-profile restaurateur and entrepreneur with several businesses to his name. With his Chicago Cubs connections, Vonachen engineered a PDC with the team in 1985 and led a rebranding of the franchise as the Peoria Chiefs. The moves were instant successes, with the team setting a league attendance record in 1985 — a record that would be broken again in 1988 and 1989.
After selling and then buying the team again, Vonachen engineered another major event with the opening of O’Brien Field in 2002. The ballpark is now known as Dozer Park after naming rights were sold to Caterpillar.
It’s been a rough past few years for Vonachen: his health has been bad, and the team experienced financial setbacks, with debt restructured and the city forgiving payments on the ballpark, which was largely built with private financing. And the Chiefs lost their player-development deal with the Cubs before the start of this season — a move that surely saddened one of the biggest Cubs fans on the planet. Still, Vonachen’s accomplishments should be celebrated: he had an enormous passion for the game and went to extremes to please Peoria baseball fans. And the team will remain in the family, with Rocky Vonachen still president of the franchise.
As you might expect, the Peoria Journal-Star is memorializing Vonachen with a series of articles:
Theobald: Pete’s now perched in a far better place
Vonachen ‘will probably have a two-day funeral; he was that popular’
Luciano: Pete kept swingin’ every day of his life
RELATED STORIES: Peoria approves Chiefs debt restructuring; Peoria set to discuss Chiefs bailout tonight; Chiefs face financial problems on ballpark debt; Cubs to honor Pete Vonachen
—-
Share your news with the baseball community. Send it to us at editors@augustpublications.com.
Are you a subscriber to the weekly Ballpark Digest newsletter? You can sign up for a free subscription at the Newsletter Signup Page.
Join Ballpark Digest on Facebook and on Twitter!
Follow Ballpark Digest on Google + and add us to your circles!