Jackie Robinson
Jackie Robinson and integration are two phrases that cannot be segregated. Whether he liked it or not, he played the star role in the integration of society during the time that he played Major League Baseball with the Brooklyn Dodgers. His heroic journey that landed him in the Majors shows, "how integration has come to baseball and how it can be achieved in every corner of the land" (Robinson 16). But this amazing triumph over the Jim Crow laws could only have been possible in New York as Robinson says, "Cooperstown, New York, and Birmingham, Alabama, are both in the Unites States. In Cooperstown I had been the guest of honor in the company of three other new Hall of Famers: Bill McKechnie, Edd Roush and Bob Feller. In Birmingham I was 'that negrah who pokes his nose into other peoples' puddin'" (14). Jackie Robinson was born in Cairo, Georgia on January 31, 1919 and was raised by his mother in Pasadena, California. He attended UCLA, where he was a baseball, basketball, football and track star. He played semi-professional football for a short time in an integrated league with the Honolulu Bears before being drafted into the army. He was honorably discharged in 1945 with the rank of second lieutenant.
Sharon AvRutick. New York: Harry N. Abrams, 1996. 5. Tygiel, Jules. Baseball's Great Experiment, Jackie Robinson and His Legacy. New York: Oxford, 1997. York: J. B. Lippincott, 1964. 2. Robinson, Jackie. I Never Had It Made. As told to Alfred Duckett. New York: New York is where it all starts. It is a city of diversity, new ideas, and radical thought. Is New York the center of the universe? It just might be. Integration of Major League Baseball, and by extension the whole American social culture, started here. "Integration in baseball has already proved that all Americans can live together in peaceful competition" (Robinson 11). The "noble experiment" of Branch Rickey obviously worked, probably even beyond his wildest dreams. Thank you Mr. Rickey and Mr. Robinson, from us all. 3. Robinson, Jackie. Baseball Has Done It. Ed. Charles Dexter. Philadelphia and New Although Jackie was finally signed with a Major League team, the discrimination didn't stop cold turkey and couldn't in some ways. It just wasn't realistically possible. For instance, Branch Rickey moved spring training for the Jim Crow South to the Caribbean, Cuba and Panama (Rampersad 160). Integration could only start in certain places such as Brooklyn, New York. The Dodgers got their name from the electric streetcars in Brooklyn that were so dangerous that people had to be skilled "dodgers" of them in order not to get run over. Why was Brooklyn the place that integration could occur? After World War Two, Brooklyn had transformed from a white-middle class population to a mix of blacks, Latinos and Jews. "About half of Brooklyn's population was Jewish; among the Dodger faithful, Jews were pr
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Approximate Word count = 1149
Approximate Pages = 5 (250 words per page double spaced)
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