Jackie Robinson
A life is not important except in the impact it has on other lives.
- Jackie Robinson.
Jackie Robinson was the first African American to play Major League baseball outside of a
segregated black league, in 1947. He became a living milestone for racial equality and changed
the sport of baseball forever.
Robinson's remarkable baseball career not only opened doors for other
blacks in early baseball history, but also opened many doors for a nation
that was struggling to live out the precepts of the 14th Amendment.
Early years
Born in Cairo, Georgia, in 1919, Jack Roosevelt Robinson was the
youngest of five children. He would confront a world of adversity at an
early age. Shortly after his birth, Jackie's father, Jerry Robinson, left the
family.
The remaining Robinsons lived with racial discrimination on the Jim
Sasser plantation. Jackie's mother, Mollie, needed to find a better life for
her children. A sharecropper family minus the main breadwinner faced destitution. In 1920, she
took Edgar, Frank, Mack, Jack, and Willa Mae to live with their uncle, Burton, in Pasadena,
California.
Uncle Burton's house was too small for the seven of them. Making minimal wages as a single
mother, Mollie nevertheless socked away money for a four-bedroom house, with Burton's help.
In spite of the restrictive neighborhood that barred blacks from Pepper Street in Pasadena, Mollie
persuaded a light-skinned black man to act as if he were buying the house. When the Robinsons
moved in, white residents became furious — and threatened to burn them out. However, that did
little to scare Mollie out of pursuing her dreams.
As an adolescent, Jackie soon found friends, and became a member of the "Pepper Street Gang"
— a group of mischievous blacks, Hispanics and Asians. The Reverend Karl Downs, the pastor at
Pasadena's Scotts Methodist Church, saw that Jackie was headed for trouble. The Reverend
Downs filled the empty, fatherless void in Jackie's life by influencing him ethically and religiously.
As a friend and mentor, the minister formed a structure in Jackie, which would eventually see him
through high school and into college.
Education
After graduating from Muir Technical High School, Robinson attended Pasadena Junior College so
that he could remain in town to support his mother. As a record-breaking athlete at PJC, Jackie
excelled in football, track — and baseball.
In 1939, Robinson enrolled in the University of California, Los Angeles, where he became a
football, basketball, track, and baseball star as well. During his first year at UCLA, Robinson met a
young nursing student, Rachel Isum, whom he married on February 10, 1947. The two would
produce three children: Jackie Jr., Sharon, and David.
While attending the university, Robinson played football with Kenny Washington, one of the first
black players in the National Football League since the early 1930s.
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Athletic talent ran rich in the Robinson family. Jackie's brother, Matthew "Mack" Robinson
(1912-2000), competed in the 1936 Summer Olympics in Berlin, finishing second in the 200meter sprint behind none other than Jesse Owens.
In 1941, Robinson left UCLA without his degree, and was hired to play football for the semipro
Honolulu Bears. After an exhibition game in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, with the Bears, Robinson was
sailing home aboard the Lurline when the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor.
Second lieutenant
On April 3, 1942, Jackie Robinson was inducted into the U.S. Army during World War II. While
Jackie was in training, Rachel, to whom Jackie was engaged, was equally busy as a nursing
student by day and a riveter by night at Lockheed Aircraft Corporation.
Robinson was accepted into officer candidate school. He graduated, earning his second
lieutenant's bars on January 28, 1943, and was assigned to Fort Riley, Kansas. After experiencing
intense racial discrimination, he was transferred to Fort Hood, Texas, for further training. The
intensity of discrimination was not any different in Texas.
A presidential executive order that desegregated the military in 1948, emboldened Robinson to
disregard a military bus driver's orders to "go to the back of the bus." Consequently, Robinson was
court-martialed for insubordination and didn't ship out to Europe with his unit. However, in 1944,
Robinson was exonerated at a trial and received an honorable discharge.
Racial history of pro baseball
The baseball world that the young Jackie Robinson knew consisted of a whites-only system of the
eight-team National and American leagues, as well as hundreds of Minor league teams.
Blacks played in the "Negro Leagues," which developed after 1900 as an alternative to the
segregated white game.
Following the notorious Black Sox Scandal of the 1919 World Series, commissioner Kenesaw
Mountain Landis incorporated more of a power-hitting game, which became the dominant playing
style, and ballparks became much larger. Ball clubs began to heavily scout promising talent, but
black and white players met only in rare non-league games. Robinson gets his break
A segregated league was not what Robinson had in mind. However, without a college degree, and
no real trade skills, he decided to pursue his dream of playing pro ball.
During spring training with the Kansas City Monarchs, Robinson thought he had hit the jackpot
when he signed on at a salary of $400 a month. It was during his one-year stint with the Monarchs
that Brooklyn Dodgers president, Branch Rickey, scouted him, and with some undercover
persuasion, eventually signed Robinson to the team at the minimum of $5,000 per month.
The Brooklyn Dodgers
Players and coaches, not only of the Dodgers, but throughout the all-white league, were outraged
that Robinson was recruited.
Robinson's first season with the Dodgers was a living hell. A group of Dodger players, led by Dixie
Walker, suggested they would strike rather than play alongside Robinson. But the team
management told them that Jackie would play and that Dixie and his mates could leave if they
wished.
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Robinson's debut put him at first base with the Dodgers on April 15, 1947. Although he lamentably
batted 0-for-3 during his first game, he would later prove to the world that he had what it took
overcome diversity and become great. In 1947, Robinson was named Rookie of the Year, and by
1949, he had received the Most Valuable Player award for the National League.
Although he was a first baseman his entire rookie year, Robinson was most magical throughout his
career at second. He also played many games at third base and in the outfield.
Upon entering the "white league," Robinson found comfort in befriending Pittsburgh Pirate Hank
Greenberg, the first Major League Jewish baseball star, who also had experienced bigotry.
Robinson belittled opposing players by employing an effective double-play combination with
shortstop Pee Wee Reese.
Besides superb fielding skills, Robinson also was an exceptionally talented and disciplined hitter,
with a career average of .311. Many players have referred to Jackie Robinson as the most
aggressive, intelligent, and successful base runner of his era.
Post-Major League Baseball
Out of the 10 years that Jackie Robinson played baseball, six of them were spent leading the
Dodgers into the World Series and was a six-time All-Star. However, because he was already 28
when he entered the league, injury began to plague Robinson — forcing him to look down the road
for other employment options.
On January 5, 1957, Robinson retired from the game he loved. With ambitions to either coach or
manage in the Major leagues, he once again became a victim of discrimination. While either being
ignored or turned down for such positions in baseball, Robinson settled for various business
opportunities, and served as an executive on the board of the National Association for the
Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) until 1967.
Between 1960 and 1968, Jackie involved himself in various presidential elections, in which he
publicly expressed his stand on civil rights.
Number 42's legacy
In 1962, Robinson became the first African American to be inducted into the Baseball Hall of
Fame. On June 4, 1972, the Dodgers retired his uniform, No. 42, alongside Roy Campanella's No.
39, and Sandy Koufax's No. 32.
On April 15, 1997, all of Major League baseball also retired No. 42, officially making the 15th of
April Jackie Robinson Day, in honor of his April 15, 1947, debut game.
Jackie Robinson died in Stamford, Connecticut, on October 24, 1972, due to complications of heart
disease. He was only 53. Robinson's remains were laid to rest at the Cypress Hills Cemetery in
Brooklyn, New York.
Following his death, the Jackie Robinson Foundation was instituted. The foundation provides
scholarships to 141 students annually who are sent to more than 60 colleges all over the country.
http://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h2068.html
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Other Resources
http://www.pbs.org/kenburns/jackie-robinson/
https://www.loc.gov/collections/jackie-robinson-baseball/articles-and-essays/baseball-the-color-lineand-jackie-robinson/
http://jackierobinson.com/
---- Selected Quotes ---Quotes by Jackie Robinson.
Regarding First Black in Major League Baseball
I'm not concerned with your liking or disliking me. All I ask is that you respect me as a human
being.
Statement to Brooklyn Dodgers teammates, 1947
- - - Books ---I Never Had it Made: An Autobiography of Jackie Robinson by Jackie Robinson
Jackie Robinson was the right man who played with the right team to break major-league baseball's
"Color Line." But as he makes clear in his autobiography, I Never Had It Made, the road for Jackie and
his family was never easy.
Brooklyn Dodgers by Mark Rucker.
If there was ever a place in America where a city and its baseball team were as close as family, it was
Brooklyn. The legacy of this relationship come...
In the Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson by Bette Bao Lord.
Shirley Temple Wong sails from China to America with a heart full of dreams. Her new home is
Brooklyn, New York. America is indeed a land full of wond...
- - - Videos ----
http://www.biography.com/video/jackie-robinson-full-episode-2190492587
http://www.history.com/topics/black-history/jackie-robinson
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