William Ashley Sunday was an 
American athlete and 
religious figure who, after being a popular 
outfielder in baseball's 
National League during the 1880s, became the most celebrated and influential American 
evangelist during the first two decades of the 20th century. Born into poverty, Sunday spent some years in an 
orphanage before taking a series of odd jobs in several small 
Iowa towns as he demonstrated his prowess in amateur athletics. Converted to 
evangelical Christianity in the 1880s, Sunday left baseball for the Christian ministry. He gradually developed his skills as a pulpit evangelist in the 
Midwest and then, during the early 20th century, he became the nation's most famous evangelist with his colloquial 
sermons and frenetic delivery. Sunday held heavily reported campaigns in America's largest cities, made a great deal of money, and was welcomed into the homes of the wealthy and influential. He may have personally preached the gospel of 
Jesus Christ to more people than any other person in history up to that time. Sunday almost certainly played a significant role in the adoption of the 
Eighteenth Amendment in 1919.
 
Washington Park Court District is a 
Grand Boulevard community area neighborhood on the 
South Side of 
Chicago, 
Illinois.  It was designated a 
Chicago Landmark on October 2, 1991.  Despite its name, it is not located within either the 
Washington Park community area or the 
Washington Park park, but is one block north of both. The district was named for the Park. The district includes 
row houses built between 1895 and 1905, with addresses of 4900–4959 South Washington Park Court and 417–439 East 50th Street.  Many of the houses share architectural features.  The neighborhood was part of the early twentieth century 
segregationist racial 
covenant wave that swept Chicago following the 
Great Migration.  The community area has continued to be almost exclusively African American since the 1930s.