Despite earning his undergrad from Loras College in Iowa and graduating from the Indiana University School of Optometry in 2008, Dr. Cundiff gained his early education in East Peoria and, most importantly, always intended to return home to pursue both his career and his dreams.

His interest in his career began when still just a young boy. “I am very nearsighted, so my childhood trips to my optometrist were always quite life changing,” Dr. Cundiff recalls. “Being able to see the world clearly with eyeglasses, sports goggles, and contact lenses made a huge impression on a young kid.  I always had a high level of intrigue about optometry. I first thought of becoming an optometrist when I was in science class in junior high.”

When Dr. Cundiff returned home, his career dream came full circle when he began working with the very optometrist who examined him as a boy, Dr. Roger Fitch of the Vision Care Center in Peoria.

“Baseball is very important to me,” he says. “My dad gave me a Mizuno glove the day I was born. I’ve been playing the game ever since. Baseball defined my summers growing up. Playing in East Peoria Community Baseball, I learned countless skills both on and off the field by playing for the legendary baseball coach Dave Rodgers. Whether playing on the diamonds on Taylor Street, EastSide Centre, or my parents’ vacant side lot — known as ‘The Field,’ baseball was summer, and summer was baseball.”

Since his senior year in high school, Dr. Cundiff has continued to play baseball competitively in the Sunday Morning League — the oldest amateur baseball league in America. Operating since 1916, the league has called the EastSide Centre its home for the last quarter century.

The more Dr. Cundiff played the more he learned to appreciate the history and importance of preserving the league. Serving as its president from 2013 to 2024, he oversaw its centennial season and its documentary film, which was included in the Cooperstown Baseball Hall of Fame film festival. “I have a deep love for the game of baseball,” he declares, only briefly lamenting: “I never made it to the pros; my plaque will never hang on the wall in Cooperstown; but by way of the Peoria Sunday Morning League, our entire league has now made it to the Hall of Fame!”

As for bison, every boy has a favorite animal and Dr. Cundiff found a way to embrace his love for his. “Never in my wildest dreams did this city guy — who never spent any time on a farm or with livestock — ever imagine that he would get to work, hands on, with our national mammal,” he says. “But by serving on the Board of Wildlife Prairie Park and volunteering with the bison herd, I have done just that. For the past four years, I have personally been raising and training our Ambassador Bison Nakoma. This experience is about as wild as it gets.”

Working with bison is just one example of how volunteering has made Dr. Cundiff’s dreams come true. The same little boy who embraced bison and baseball also looked wide-eyed at the Festival of Lights East Peoria Illinois (FOLEPI). “I was two years old when the Festival of Lights began.  My parents took me to that first parade as a little guy and I was hooked!” he remembers.

But for the young Timothy, looking at the lights was never quite enough. Asking his father how the festival mascot, FOLEPI the Toy Soldier, was chosen, his father introduced him to Maurice Joseph after mass one Sunday. One of the founding fathers of the Festival of Lights, “Mr. Joseph informed me I wasn’t quite tall or old enough for the role, but if I grew several more inches, I could be a candidate someday,” Dr. Cundiff shares. “That must have been all the inspiration that 10-year-old me needed.”

Many years and a few growth spurts later, the 6-foot 6-inch Dr. Cundiff was finally the right size to fit the suit. Performing for his longtime baseball teammate, league commissioner, and Festival of Lights Director Doug McCarty was Dr. Cundiff’s final step toward fulfilling another childhood dream.

As the new FOLEPI, Dr. Cundiff indeed had big shoes to fill right off the bat as that Christmas of 2019 marked the Festival of Light’s inclusion in the ABC Show “The Great Christmas Light Fight,” in which the City of East Peoria won the Heavyweight Championship Trophy.

The bison herd and Festival of Lights aside, Dr. Cundiff has also somehow found the time to volunteer with numerous organizations in the 18 years since returning to his hometown. Serving on the Board of Directors of Peoria Riverfront Museum, the Young Professionals Organization of Greater Peoria, Lakeview Museum, Methodist College, and Illinois Optometric Association, he has also volunteered with the East Peoria Chamber of Commerce.

“Giving back is two-fold,” he explains. “It is an opportunity to help an organization by donating time, talent, and resources to help support these incredibly important institutions for our community. But it also provides a sense of pride and fulfillment in making a difference and provides me a strong sense of fulfillment by fueling various passions of mine. Giving back is the best way to connect on a deeper level with one’s community.”

The youngest of four children, Dr. Cundiff cites his “incredible parents and siblings” as his mentors and sources of inspiration. “I wanted to be just like them,” he says. “They have all had successful careers and have volunteered in many ways. My skills and talents are nothing more than a combination of the skills and talents that I’ve received from my parents and siblings. I thank God every day for my family, my friends, and my community…and for my bison Nakoma.”

East Peoria is where Dr. Cundiff found and continues to find his inspiration to do everything he does because it is his home. “It’s home to my parents, to many of my childhood friends, to my hometown church — St. Monica’s,” he concludes. “There is a special spirit about East Peoria — the people, the businesses, the community, and especially the Festival of Lights.”

For Dr. Cundiff, that special spirit of East Peoria arises not just from being the hometown where his childhood dreams were born, but also the hometown where they came true.

Dr. Timothy G. Cundiff is an optometrist at Vision Care Center in Peoria, Illinois, located at 4727 North Sheridan Road. He can also be seen as FOLEPI the toy soldier during the East Peoria Festival of Lights, which begins near Thanksgiving and runs until just after the New Year.