Jackie Robinson In Baseball

In 1919, Jack Roosevelt Robinson was born in Cairo, Georgia. His family being sharecroppers, Jackie's mother, Mallie, raised Jackie and his four other siblings.(JackieRobinson.com) Being the only black family on the block, his family faced discrimination and racism from neighbors all around. From a humble beginning, Jackie was an outstanding athlete.(larrylester42.com) Jackie was promoted from Washington Junior High. Later, he entered John Muir High School after his junior high career. Recognizing his athletic ability, Robinson's older brothers inspired Jackie to pursue sports.(Jackierobinson.com)

Baseball has always been more than just a sport to the American people. For many, it is a way of life, teaching not just brute skills but life lessons and morals. In the wake of World War I, racism and bigotry abounded in the United States. Even though the integration of schools had recently been instated, Jim Crow laws severely limited the activity of African Americans in society, resulting in baseball teams being limited to whites. Jackie Robinson made an important step in gaining rights for African Americans when he broke the color barrier of baseball in 1947. He did this by making civil rights his ambition even before the protests began (Coombs 117). Jackie Robinson’s fame as a baseball player and determination to defeat adversity

Born on January 31, 1919 Jack Roosevelt Robinson was the youngest of five children. His father left the family before Jackie turned one and shortly after his mom moved the family from Georgia to California in search of work (Contemporary Black Biography). Segregation was still present in California, but was less harsh than in the south. To get away from the problems and racial prejudice, Jackie turned to sports. He was an exceptional athlete excelling in football, baseball, basketball, and track in both high school and college. He played four sports for the University of California Los Angeles (commonly known as UCLA). He was mostly a football and basketball star and had no intentions of playing Major League baseball due to the fact that it was all white. Jackie had always wanted to become a social worker to help underprivileged boys and hoped that travelling the nation for sports would expose him to a job in that field

Robinson certainly faced many different challenges. For example, they did not allow Robinson to stay at white hotels when they had over night games, which left him to be alone most nights. One reporter stated, “Robinson is the loneliest man I have ever seen in sports” (Brown 3). Additionally, many coaches, players, and fans abused Robinson. They did so by name calling at games, sending death threats, and intentionally hitting him with pitches (Graf 2). Opposing teams would always pick at Robinson by saying, “Hey, boy, come and shine my shoes,” or “Boy, why ain’t you picking cotton” (Brown 1, 2). “Robinson was proud and tough.” Despite all the negative activity, Robinson stayed composed and never let himself or his community down. “Proud and tough” was how Robinson became known. Nothing was going to stop him from proving he

“Near six o’clock on the evening of January 31, 1919, Jack Roosevelt Robinson was born somewhere near the town of Cairo in Grandy County in southern Georgia” (Rampersad 10). Jackie’s parents, Jerry and Mallie Robinson, first lived together on a small plantation just south of Cairo. Mallie Robinson raised her five children single handedly, and they later moved to Pasadena, California, which was not the most racially friendly environment due to the Robinsons being the only black family on the block. Not having a father in the home, he looked up to his older brothers and saw them as his future, they are the ones who introduced him into the sports

Baseball has always been America's national pastime. In the early and all the way into the mid 50's, baseball was America and America was baseball. The only thing lacking in the great game was the absence of African American players and the presence of an all white sport. America still wasn't friendly or accepted the African American race and many still held great prejudice towards them. All this would change when the general manager of the Brooklyn Dodgers, Branch Rickey decided he was going to sign a Negro player. Jackie Robinson was that player and Jackie Robinson changed the game, America, and history. By looking specifically at his childhood adversity, college life and the hardships he encountered by becoming the first black player in

Jackie Robinson’s background and childhood environment had a major impact on the ways he went about changing African American lives. He is famous for saying that “a life is not important except in the impact it has on other lives” (Jackie 1). Jack (Jackie) Roosevelt Robinson is famously well-known for becoming the first black player in the major leagues and playing with the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947. He was born on January 31, 1919, in Cairo, Georgia. He also was the youngest of five children and he was raised by a single mother. His older brother, Matthew, actually inspired him to pursue his dream in sports. Surprisingly, Matthew won a silver medal in the 200-meter-dash, just behind Jesse Owens in the 1936 Olympic games in Berlin. Jackie went to John Muir High School and Pasadena Junior College, which are the places where he played a various amount of sports growing up. His reputation as a household name began to gain traction during this time. He was awarded the Region’s Most Valuable

Another incident of discrimination that Robinson dealt with was his so called “fan mail.” While some of his mail was touching and encouraged him to keep pressing on for the sake of the game of baseball, a lot of his mail was sent as threats and insults. Robinson disposed of a lot of this kind of mail, but some of the letters would end up in the newspaper! A large number of the letters were also directed at Branch Rickey and would threaten him and his family (198). The letters appeared not to phase Robinson much like the other threats and insults that were yelled at him wherever he went. He kept his head high and he continued to play the game of baseball with lots of energy and motivation each time he came to the ballpark.

The story of Jackie Robinson has become one of America's most iconic and inspiring stories. Since 1947, American history has portrayed Jackie Robinson as a hero, and he has been idolized as a role model to the African American baseball community. It is an unarguable fact that he was the first to tear down the color barriers within professional baseball. The topic of Robinson’s role in integration has long been a point of discussion amongst baseball historians. Researchers have accumulated thousands of accredited documents and interviews with friends and team mates such as short stop, Pee Wee Reese, and team owner, Branch Rickey. However, few journalists have asked why Robinson was selected and what was Branch

Baseball is one of the nations pastimes, and accepting a black man playing baseball made it easier to see integration in more important instances. Branch Rickey was an innovative MLB executive who had high hopes for Robinson. Rickey saw the qualities that Jackie Robinson possessed and his hope was that he could use Jack to help break the color barrier. Respect and equality was important in Robinson 's career and he knew that blacks needed to be accepted in the Major Leagues in order for the league to be just. Having this knowledge made him stick with baseball even when he thought about quitting. Jackie 's commitment was one of the most important values for successfully breaking the color barrier, and his attitude of determination and persistence helped him fight for justice. With the help of Rickey and many peers, Jackie agreed to sign with the Dodgers, where he remained committed so that more could follow in his path on and off the field.

“Jackie Robinson was born on the thirty first day of January in 1919”. (biography.com) He was born to a family of sharecroppers in the town of Cairo Georgia, but Jackie grew up in Pasadena California. (Jackie Robinson official website) Jackie grew up being raised by only his mother and his older siblings helped out as well. He had four siblings, three older brothers and one sister. (Britannica encyclopedia) Jackie was the youngest of five kids and they all helped out each other in school, sports, and chores. The Robinson family was the only African American family on their block, but the bias acts of the white people surrounding them didn’t hurt them, but prepared them for their future. (Jackie Robinson official website) Jackie’s older brother Matthew gave him his inspiration to take on sports just as he did. He has always had a huge love for sports in his childhood years. (Jackie Robinson book pg: 4)

Jackie was a phenomenal athlete for young kids to look up to. After the start of World War II he served in the military from 1942 to 1944. After the war he returned to his love for baseball, playing in the Black major leagues. He was chosen by Branch Rickey, vice president of the Brooklyn dodgers, to help integrate the Major Leagues. Rickey hated segregation just as much as Robinson and wanted to change things “Rickey had once seen a Black college player turned away from a hotel… Rickey never forgot seeing this player crying because he was denied a place to lay his weary head just because of the color of his skin” (Mackenzie). He was finally able to do something about segregation and help change baseball and the United States for the better. It wasn’t that all the teams were racist and didn’t want a black player but when the major league teams had an away game they would rent out the stadium to the black teams for them to play at. And the executives of teams didn’t want to loose the money that they were making off of the black teams. “League owners would lose significant rental revenue” (“Breaking”). He soon signed with the all-white Montreal Royals a farm team for the Dodgers. Robinson had an outstanding start with the Royals, “leading the International League with a .349 batting average and .985 fielding percentage” (Robinson). After Robinson’s outstanding year he was promoted to the Dodgers he played his first game on

Since the abolition of slavery in the USA in 1883 and through the first half of the 20th Century, African Americans had been in a constant struggle to try and gain an equal footing in society. Like many aspects of American life, black sportsmen were segregated, and no African American had played professional baseball since 1884. For this reason, the integration of Jackie Robinson to the Brooklyn Dodgers as the first African American to play Major League baseball in the modern era had a grand impact on the entire country. From the moment that Dodgers owner, Branch Rickey decided that Robinson would break the colour lone, the history of sport and the history of African Americans would not be the same again. The importance of his integration and the effect it had on civil rights can be looked at in many different ways. It had great effect on the African American community, instilling pride and belief once again in the American Dream for many who had once thought it impossible. It also had significant importance for civil rights groups, and brought about a figure who would fight his peoples quest for equal rights until the day he died. It was a significant risk taken by both Rickey and Robinson, professionally and personally. But it was a risk that both in the short term for African American sport, and in the long run for African American civil rights, was ultimately well worth taking.

Before Jackie Robinson became the most famous African-American baseball player in the Major Leagues. He signed with the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947. In 1947 he was named Rookie of the Year, National League MVP and also was a World Series champion in 1955. Jackie was born in Cairo, Georgia on January 31, 1919. (“Jackie Robinson”). Jackie had played four sports at

Jackie Roosevelt Robinson was born on January 31st 1919. In 1947, at the age of 28, Jackie became the first African American to break the “color line” of Major League Baseball when he debuted with the Brooklyn Dodgers. During his tenure with the Dodgers, Jackie was not simply an average player. Among various other accolades, Mr. Robinson was a starter on six World Series teams as well as being named the National League Rookie of The Year in 1947. His advantageous career was then capped in 1962 when he was inducted in the Major League Baseball Hall of Fame.1 Contrary to popular belief, Jackie's perseverance in implementing racial integration extended beyond his career in Major League Baseball. During the Sixties Jackie Robinson was a