Major League Baseball commentator for Seattle Mariners, grew up in Blue Island Ronald Rotunda, noted Constitutional scholar, Assistant Majority Counsel for the Senate Watergate Committee, and Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute, grew up in Rock Island. Eugene Rousseau, saxophonist, was born in Blue Island Robert A. Schuller, televangelist, former minister on the Hour of Power TV show at the Crystal Cathedral, was born in Blue Island Robert E. Seyfarth, early 20th century architect Gary Sinise, actor, director, and musician Del Staecker, author Tom Toth, NFL player, was born in Blue Island George "Babe" Tuffanelli, mafia boss Steve Wojciechowski, MLB pitcher for Oakland Athletics, was born in Blue Island Anthony E. Zuiker, creator of TV series CSI, was born in Blue Island Chip Z'nuff, bassist and frontman of rock band Enuff Z'Nuff, raised and still resides in Blue Island In popular culture Writers and literature Over the years, Blue Island has provided the setting for the works of at least a couple of writers. In 1935, for example, the Chicago playwright and Pulitzer Prize-winning author Margaret Ayer Barnes (1886-–1967) wrote the novel Edna, His Wife, an American Idyll, using Blue Island as the first locale of the four that make up her story (the other three being Chicago, Washington, D.C., and New York City). The book chronicles the life of the title character who spent her formative years in Blue Island but leaves after she marries, becoming increasingly unhappy as she leads a more sophisticated life elsewhere while "...remain[ing] a Blue Island girl at heart." The book was later adapted into a one-woman play by Cornelia Otis Skinner, and her opening night performance of it at the Harris Theater was enthusiastically received by Chicago society, which was pleased to "...have a chance to see a Chicago play in a Chicago theater..." Twelve years later, Gus the Great, the Book of the Month Club selection for September 1947, was published. The book was a runaway best seller, and its author, Thomas W. Duncan, is reputed to have earned $250,000 () in royalties from it, including $100,000 () from Universal Studios for the movie rights. It is the story of the life and adventures of Gus Burgoyne, a circus owner of questionable character. Duncan was a college friend of Hill Lakin, the editor of the Blue Island Sun-Standard, and, after a visit to the town's industrial section, he was inspired to use