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Barack Obama ran as the Democratic nominee in the 2004 election for the United States Senate.  He won 70% of the vote against Republican nominee, Alan Keyes.  Obama had previously served in the Illinois Senate, from 1997-2004.  He served as a U.S. Senator from 2005-2008, before being elected President of the United States in 2008.  

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The Raleigh Bicycle Company was first established in 1885 in the United Kingdom, named after the street that the first shop was on. The company opened more shops and in 1899 began building motorcycles, exporting their vehicles to countries across Europe and North America through the 1960s. Rampar is a shortening of the name for the American branch of distribution, called Raleigh America Parts. The rights to the name Raleigh USA were bought by the Huffy Corporation in 1982, and both Raleigh and Huffy continue to sell bikes across the world. Today Raleigh bikes and motorcycles are treasured collectors items, and Raleigh is one of the oldest bicycle companies in the world.

Raleigh Bicycle Company. (n.d.). Retrieved November 3, 2015 from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Raleigh_Bicycle_Company.

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Jane Byrne served as 50^th Mayor of Chicago, the only woman to hold the position. First entering politics as a volunteer for John F. Kennedy’s 1960 Presidential campaign, Byrne became head of the Consumer Affairs Department of Chicago in 1968. Byrne campaigned to be Mayor of Chicago in the 1979 election against incumbent Michael Bilandic. Against the odds, Byrne won the election and became mayor in 1979. Many cite her victory as a reaction to Bilandic's ineffective leadership in response to a blizzard that occurred during the campaign. Byrne’s term as mayor was characterized by social reforms including recognition of the LGBT community and instituting a ban on unregistered handguns in Chicago. Byrne is perhaps most well known for temporarily moving into the Cabrini-Green housing project, in an effort to highlight the dangerous living conditions in Chicago's public housing. 

Byrne ran for re-election in 1983, but lost to Harold Washington. She ran for mayor three more times, but lost each time. Byrne died in 2014, after which the Circle Interchange in downtown Chicago was renamed the Jane Byrne Interchange in her honor.

Jane Byrne. (n.d.). Retrieved November 1, 2015 from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jane_Byrne.

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James Dooley was a Democratic lawyer from the state of Illinois. Upon passing the Illinois Bar exam in 1937, he worked as an attorney and at Clarke College. In 1976, he successfully ran for the Supreme Court of Illinois. Dooley served in this capacity until his death in 1978.  

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Known as the "father of the Illinois constitution," Samuel W. Witwer was a Chicago lawyer who was born in Colorado in 1908. Witwer unsuccessfully ran for the U.S. Senate against incumbent Paul H. Douglas in 1960. He attended Dickinson College and graduated from Harvard Law School in 1933. He was the Illinois state chairman for the Committee for Constitutional Revision from 1950-1957, and was chosen as president of an Illinois state constitutional convention in 1968. Witwer was board president of Dickinson College for 15 years and director of several civic organizations such as the Chicago Urban League, the Chicago Council on Foreign Relations, and Citizens for a Greater Chicago. He died in 1998.

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William Joseph “Joe” Walsh is a Republican politician turned conservative talk radio host from the Chicago area. In 1996, Walsh was the Republican contender for Illinois’ 9th District seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. He lost to the long-time incumbent Democrat Sidney R. Yates. This button is most likely from that campaign. In 1998, Walsh campaigned of the 58th district seat in the Illinois House of Representatives, eventually losing the election to the incumbent Democrat. 

Walsh considered himself a moderate Republican in the 1990s, but gradually grew more conservative. In the 2010 mid-term elections, Walsh surprisingly upset the incumbent Democrat and won Illinois’ 8th District seat in the U.S. House of Representatives. He served one term in the House, from 2011 to 2013, and was a popular figure within the Tea Party movement. Walsh was defeated in the 2012 election by Democrat Tammy Duckworth, and, as of 2015, he hosts a Chicago-based conservative talk radio show.

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Paul Tsongas was a United States Representative from the 5th congressional district in Massachusetts from 1975 to 1979. Tsongas then won the seat of United States Senator from 1979 to 1985.  Tsongas attempted to win the Democratic presidential nomination for the 1992 election but was unsuccessful.  Tsongas played an integral role in his support over the historic preservation and conservation of different environmental causes as well as his pro-business style approach to economics. Tsongas also played a major role in the development and growth of the National Parks System and helped the passage of the Alaskan National Lands Conservation Act of 1980.  From the late 1970's until his death in 1997, Tsongas battled non-Hodgkin lymphoma.

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Paul Simon (1928-2003) was born in Eugene, Oregon but moved to Illinois in 1948. Simon served in the U.S. Army during the Korean War from 1950-1953, and entered politics in 1955 as part of the Democratic party. He was in the Illinois State Congress until 1968 and became Illinois's Lieutenant Governor in 1969. From 1975 to 1985 Simon served as an U.S. Representative then served as a U.S. Senator for Illinois from 1985 until his retirement in 1997. Simon unsuccessfully ran for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1988. His signature look of horn-rimmed glasses and distinctive bow ties became a trademark later incorporated into campaign logos.

After Simon left office in 1997, he established and served as the director of The Paul Simon Public Policy Institute at Southern Illinois University in Carbondale until his death in 2003.

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