Among the stops on Canton High School hot shot Dave Downey’s official visit to the UI was an off-campus spot he’d wind up growing to love: Po’Boys, owned and operated by Arnold “Arnie” Yarber, the UI’s one-time athletic trainer.
“A little-bitty building” at 58 E. Columbia Ave., as Downey remembers it, but one that served food to die for.
“Pork sandwiches. Beef sandwiches, hot or mild. Polish sausage. And ribs.”
Not a big menu but one that Downey sampled often over the years as he formed a lasting bond with the late Mr. Yarber.
In their early years, “as I got to know him, I found out he was kind of a counselor and contact for the black athletes because in those days, there weren’t any other black students,” Downey says.
Often with an assist from his friend, Downey himself would go on to play a key role in helping bridge the divide that existed back then in what he says “was not a real liberal community.”
He and Arnie became “especially close during the civil rights era,” with Downey saddling up to the Po’Boys counter and talking about the lack of black coaches and, later, local race relations for hours on end.
“Once I got out of school, he continued to be a friend. It was an important part of my life — and I think, important to him — to have that bridge between the business community and the black community,” says Downey, who was asked to speak at his friend’s funeral in 2007.
“Since my first trip to Po’Boys, he was always a good friend. It was just natural for us.”
Six decades after he scored his 1,360th and final point in orange and blue, Downey’s name is still all over the basketball record book.
His 53-point effort on the road against Indiana has never been matched. His 18.9-point scoring average ranks fifth in program history. He’s Illinois’ lone three-time team MVP, one of four Illini to average double-digit rebounds over his career and No. 3 all-time in double-doubles.
And post-Illinois, the inspiration behind State Farm Center’s Club 53 has made an even bigger mark, with two nine-digit donations to the Carle Illinois College of Medicine. The latest was revealed in June 2025 — a $2 million gift from Downey and wife Jane Hays to create a new student scholarship (with preference for a student from Illinois) and professorship in clinical translational research or innovation.
The gift, like the $1 million one before it, honors former Chancellor Phyllis Wise, who “played a crucial role in founding” higher ed’s first engineering-based college of medicine, the university announced.
Said Downey: “The university has one of the best public engineering colleges in the world. Carle Illinois leverages our faculty’s renowned engineering and technical skills and applies them to all aspects of medical training and innovation.”
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