List of Famous people born in Illinois, United States of America

Mark Clark was an American activist and member of the Black Panther Party. He was killed with Fred Hampton during a Chicago police predawn raid on December 4, 1969.

Robert "Bob" Bondurant is an American former racecar driver who raced for the Shelby American, Ferrari and Eagle teams. Bondurant was one of the most famous drivers to emerge from the Southern California road racing scene in the 1950s, and achieved success in North America and in Europe. His Bob Bondurant School of High Performance Driving has been responsible for training generations of American racing drivers.

Louis Henry Saban was an American football player and coach. He played for Indiana University in college and as a professional for the Cleveland Browns of the All-America Football Conference between 1946 and 1949. Saban then began a long coaching career. After numerous jobs at the college level, he became the first coach of the Boston Patriots in the American Football League (AFL) in 1960. He joined the Buffalo Bills two years later, and led the team to consecutive AFL championships in 1964 and 1965. After serving briefly as head coach at the University of Maryland, he was hired as head coach of the Denver Broncos in 1967, where he remained for five years. Saban returned to the Bills—by then in the National Football League following the AFL–NFL merger—from 1972 to 1976, reaching the playoffs once but failing to bring Buffalo another championship.

Akiane Kramarik is an American poet and painter. She began drawing at the age of four. Kramarik's best-known painting is Prince of Peace, which she completed at the age of eight.

Karl Patterson Schmidt was an American herpetologist.

John George Agar Jr. was an American film and television actor. He is best known for starring alongside John Wayne in the films Sands of Iwo Jima, Fort Apache, and She Wore a Yellow Ribbon. In his later career he was the star of B movies, such as Tarantula, The Mole People, The Brain from Planet Arous, Revenge of the Creature, Flesh and the Spur and Hand of Death. He was the first husband of Shirley Temple.

Ginger Lynn Allen is an American pornographic actress and model who was a premier adult-entertainment star of the 1980s. She also had minor roles in various B movies. AVN has ranked her at #7 in a list of the 50 greatest porn stars of all time. After ending her pornography career, she began using her full name, Ginger Lynn Allen, and found work in a variety of B-movies. She had a late-career return to the adult industry and made a brief series of movies. Allen is a member of AVN, NightMoves Adult Entertainment, and XRCO Halls of Fame.

Lorraine Vivian Hansberry was a playwright and writer. She was the first African-American female author to have a play performed on Broadway. Her best known work, the play A Raisin in the Sun, highlights the lives of Black Americans living under racial segregation in Chicago. The title of the play was taken from the poem "Harlem" by Langston Hughes: "What happens to a dream deferred? Does it dry up like a raisin in the sun?" At the age of 29, she won the New York Drama Critics' Circle Award — making her the first African-American dramatist, the fifth woman, and the youngest playwright to do so. Hansberry's family had struggled against segregation, challenging a restrictive covenant and eventually provoking the 1940 Supreme Court case Hansberry v. Lee.

Milton Lee Olive III was a United States Army soldier and a recipient of America's highest military decoration — the Medal of Honor — for his actions in the Vietnam War. At the age of 18, Olive sacrificed his life to save others by falling on a grenade. He was the first African-American recipient of the Medal of Honor from the Vietnam War.

Sandy Bentley is notable both individually and with her sister Amanda (Mandy) Bentley as the Bentley Twins. The 5 foot 9 inch tall twins were featured on the May 2000 cover of Playboy and were well known as Hugh Hefner's live-in lovers at the Playboy Mansion during 1999 and 2000.