The Significance Of Jackie Robinson's Breaking The Color Barrier In Major League Baseball
pril 15 marks the anniversary of Jackie Robinson's breaking of the color barrier in Major League Baseball. A student once asked me: "What is the color barrier?" Baseball's "color barrier" signifies the time in American history when black- and brown-skinned ballplayers were kept out of the Majors. In 1947, my father, Jackie Robinson, broke through that barrier and opened the door for others to follow.
Fifty years later, Breaking Barriers: In Sports, In Life was created to help diverse students understand Jackie Robinson's legacy of change. By participating in this program, you'll come to understand the values that made my father successful on the field, and which also guided him as a parent. You'll likewise discover strengths in your own character
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Briefly in the late 1800s, two black players, Bud Fowler and Moses Fleetwood Walker, played alongside whites. But by 1890, Major League Baseball, like most of America, was "segregated." Until 1947, black- and brown-skinned players were in the Negro Leagues, while whites played in the Majors.
In 1945, Branch Rickey, president and general manager of the Brooklyn Dodgers™, stepped
forward to break baseball's color barrier. He studied the field, using scouts to explore the pool of players. There were many Negro League players who were well-known and proven professional baseball players. Players such as Satchel Paige and Josh Gibson certainly headed the list provided by Mr. Rickey's scouts, but they agreed on Jack Roosevelt Robinson.
The scouts told Mr. Rickey that, during his season with the Negro League team the Kansas City Monarchs, Jackie Robinson played shortstop. He hit .387, perfected his skill at stealing bases, and was selected for the league's All-Star Game.
They presented my father's college statistics next. Rickey learned that while at UCLA, my dad was the leading basketball scorer in his conference, the national champion in the long jump, an All-American halfback in football, and a varsity baseball shortstop. In fact, he was the first athlete at UCLA to letter in four sports in a single
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2122 Words | 9 PagesBranch Rickey, the president of the Brooklyn Dodgers, decided that he wanted to integrate baseball and bring an African American into the MLB. He went through many, many different players and had to look at much more than their ability to see if he wanted to give them an opportunity to play for his baseball club. Rickey finally decided that Jackie Robinson was the one he wanted to take a chance on, not because he was the best African American baseball player, but because he would be able to handle himself in the extremely difficult environment he was asking him to play baseball through (1). From being an outstanding multi-sport athlete to refusing to give up his seat in Texas, to Robinson’s courageous outlook on breaking the color barrier, Rickey knew that he was the right man for the job. In 1946, Robinson played in first year on the Montreal Royals, a minor league team in the Brooklyn Dodgers Organization.
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