Jackie Robinson breaks color barrier - Apr 15, 1947 - HISTORY.com On this day in history in 1947, Jackie Robinson, age 28, becomes the first African-American player in Major League Baseball when he steps onto Ebbets Field in Brooklyn to compete for the Brooklyn Dodgers. Lead Story Jackie Robinson breaks color barrier Share this: Jackie Robinson breaks color barrier Author Jackie Robinson breaks color barrier URL Publisher A+E Networks On this day in 1947, Jackie Robinson, age 28, becomes the first African-American player in Major League Baseball when he steps onto Ebbets Field in Brooklyn to compete for the Brooklyn Dodgers. Robinson broke the color barrier in a sport that had been segregated for more than 50 years. Exactly 50 years later, on April 15, 1997, Robinson’s groundbreaking career was honored and his uniform number, 42, was retired from Major League Baseball by Commissioner Bud Selig in a ceremony attended by over 50,000 fans at New York City’s Shea Stadium. Robinson’s was the first-ever number retired by all teams in the league.

Jack Roosevelt Robinson was born January 31, 1919, in Cairo, Georgia, to a family of sharecroppers. Growing up, he excelled at sports and attended the University of California at Los Angeles, where he was the first athlete to letter in four varsity sports: baseball, basketball, football and track. After financial difficulties forced Robinson to drop out of UCLA, he joined the army in 1942 and was commissioned as a second lieutenant. After protesting instances of racial discrimination during his military service, Robinson was court-martialed in 1944. Ultimately, though, he was honorably discharged. After the army, Robinson played for a season in the Negro American League. In 1945, Branch Rickey, general manager of the Brooklyn Dodgers, recruited Robinson, who was known for his integrity and intelligence as well as his talent, to join one of the club’s farm teams. In 1947, Robinson was called up to the Majors and soon became a star infielder and outfielder for the Dodgers, as well as the National League’s Rookie of the Year.

In 1949, the right-hander was named the National League’s Most Valuable Player and league batting champ. Robinson played on the National League All-Star team from 1949 through 1954 and led the Dodgers to six National League pennants and one World Series, in 1955. He was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1962, his first year of eligibility. Despite his talent and success as a player, Robinson faced tremendous racial discrimination throughout his career, from baseball fans and some fellow players. Additionally, Jim Crow laws prevented Robinson from using the same hotels and restaurants as his teammates while playing in the South. After retiring from baseball in 1957, Robinson became a businessman and civil rights activist. He died October 24, 1972, at age 53, in Stamford, Connecticut.

Related Videos Jackie Robinson breaks major league color barrier - Apr 15, 1947 - HISTORY.com Jackie Robinson breaks major league color barrier Share this: Jackie Robinson breaks major league color barrier Author Jackie Robinson breaks major league color barrier URL Publisher A+E Networks On April 15, 1947, Jackie Robinson becomes the first African-American in the major leagues when he plays his first game with the Brooklyn Dodgers. Jack Roosevelt Robinson was born into a family of sharecroppers on January 31, 1919, in Cairo, Georgia. He attended UCLA, where he became the first athlete to letter in four varsity sports: baseball, basketball, football and track. He served in the U.S. Army from 1942 to 1944 and was honorably discharged after facing insubordination charges for refusing to move to the back of a segregated bus. After leaving the military, Robinson played shortstop for the Kansas City Monarchs in the Negro League. In 1945, he was recruited by Dodgers president and general manager Branch Rickey, who was determined to end the unwritten segregation rule in the majors.

In 1946, Robinson joined the Dodgers’ farm team, the Montreal Royals, and went on to lead the league in batting. On April 15, 1947, 28-year-old Jackie Robinson made his Major League Baseball debut with the Dodgers, against the Boston Braves, in front of more than 25,000 spectators at Ebbets Field in Brooklyn, New York. Robinson played first base and went zero for three at the plate. During his first season in the majors, Robinson encountered racism from opposing teams and fans, as well as some of his own teammates. However, the abuse didn’t affect his performance on the baseball field. Robinson played in 151 games, hit .297, stole more bases than anyone else in the National League and was awarded the first-ever Rookie of the Year title. In 1949, Robinson, who had switched to playing second base, was named the National League’s Most Valuable Player. The next year he became the Dodgers’ highest paid player, earning a salary of $35,000. In 1955, Robinson helped the Dodgers defeat the New York Yankees to win the World Series.

He retired from baseball after playing his last game on October 10, 1956, with a career batting average of .311, 1,518 hits and 137 home runs. After leaving baseball, Robinson worked as a business executive and continued his involvement in civil rights causes. On October 24, 1972, he died at age 53 from heart problems and complications related to diabetes. Robinson became the first African-American inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1962, his first year of eligibility. In 1997, on the 50th anniversary of his historic first game in the majors, Robinson’s uniform number–42–was retired by Major League Baseball. Related Videos Baseball Great Jackie Robinson Broke Color Barrier in 1947 | IIP Digital Baseball Great Jackie Robinson Broke Color Barrier in 1947 First black major league baseball player key to desegregating sports By David Pitts | Staff Writer | 01 January 2007 Brooklyn Dodger infielder Jackie Robinson poses for a picture in May 1952.

Washington -- Few people can claim to have played a pivotal role in changing their country for the better. One American who earned that distinction during his rather brief lifetime was Jackie Robinson, the first black player to break the color barrier in U.S. major league baseball. It is impossible to overstate the significance of what happened when Robinson joined the Dodgers organization six decades ago. In 1947, American society was still largely closed to blacks -- with de jure segregation entrenched in the former slave-owning states of the South and de facto discrimination rampant in the North. Resistance to integrating baseball, "America's pastime," was strong, both within and outside the game. The story of how the racial barrier was broken centers on the lives of two men, one white and one black, who, for different reasons, were determined not only to change the situation, but to make the change stick. Branch Rickey, president of the Brooklyn Dodgers, who was white, believed passionately that integrating baseball was not only the right thing to do, but was in the long-term best interests of the game.

He chose Robinson, an all-American football player at UCLA (University of California at Los Angeles), to break the racial barrier because Robinson was a superior athlete -- but primarily because he felt that Robinson had the mental toughness to withstand the inevitable racial slurs and jibes he would suffer without exploding into rage. Robinson, for his part, was acutely conscious of the significance of being the first black major league baseball player this century and what it could mean for the wider struggle of African-Americans for racial equality across America. The following exchange between Rickey and Robinson when they first met in 1945 has been immortalized in museum exhibits and elsewhere: Robinson: "Mr. Rickey, are you looking for a Negro who is afraid to fight back?" Rickey: "I'm looking for a ballplayer with guts enough not to fight back." Robinson: "I think I can play ball in Brooklyn. If you want to take this gamble, I promise you there will be no incidents." Two years later, on opening day of the 1947 season, Robinson strode onto Brooklyn's Ebbets Field baseball diamond. That season, he led the Dodgers to the first of six pennants the team would win with Robinson playing second base for them.

He was named National League Rookie of the Year. In his autobiography, Robinson recalls that he was deeply hurt by the racial catcalls and poor treatment he received from some fans, fellow teammates, and opposing teams. One Dodger player who began a petition drive to drop Robinson was traded away by Rickey. But Robinson kept his promise and never responded to the harassment. His dignity and bearing, as well as his performance on the field, earned him the respect of a majority of the fans as well as the public at large, and the Dodgers broke major league attendance records during his first season on the team. "I had started the season as a lonely man, often feeling like a black Don Quixote tilting at white windmills. I ended it feeling like a member of a solid team," he said. Robinson's courage paid off. Because of his success, the Dodgers signed other black players, including catcher Roy Campanella and pitcher Don Newcombe. Other teams followed suit, but it was not until 1959, when the Boston Red Sox hired Elijah "Pumpsie" Green, that the game was completely integrated at the player level.

Ironically, the integration of major league baseball spelled disaster for the Negro Leagues, the all-black baseball teams that were founded because of segregation. The "majors" raided the black teams for such top talent as Satchel Paige, Willie Mays, Joe Black, and Monte Irvin. The Negro National League disbanded in 1948, the Negro American League in 1960. Ernest Burke, who played for the Baltimore Elite Giants -- another Negro League Team - from 1946 until 1948, has said, "Jackie is a legend to every black ball player and to every black man in America." He recalled Robinson saying, after his selection, "There is now no looking back; we're in, the door has been cracked." Robinson retired from major league baseball in 1956, but he continued to be active in the then infant civil rights movement and was a strong supporter of Martin Luther King Jr., who once said that his task was made easier because of what Jackie Robinson did.

Although change was slow in coming, the racial views of many white Americans began to shift markedly in the years after Robinson integrated baseball, as they slowly became more conscious of the incongruity between American democratic principles and their attitudes towards their fellow citizens of color. With the growing change in racial beliefs, other areas of American life began to be desegregated as well. In 1948, just one year after the integration of major league baseball, President Truman ordered the desegregation of the U.S. armed forces. In 1954, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled school segregation unconstitutional. In 1955, Rosa Parks' refusal to sit at the back of a bus in Montgomery, Alabama, as required then by state law, sparked the modern civil rights movement, which ultimately led to the demise of segregation and to major civil rights and voting rights laws. The physical toll on Robinson during his long struggle for racial equality was staggering. He developed diabetes and heart disease, which some biographers assert was worsened by years of stress as a result of dealing with racial issues. Jackie Robinson succumbed to heart disease at the age of 53 in 1972, his hair having turned white some years before.

He was buried in the New York borough of Brooklyn, where he first played for the Dodgers exactly a quarter-century before. Jackie Robinson is shown on March 2, 1954, at Vero Beach, Florida. Keywords: Basketball player at UCLA - Jackie Robinson broke baseball's color barrier - Pictures - CBS News Next Jackie Robinson 1948 On April 15 of each season, Major League Baseball celebrates Jackie Robinson Day commemorating the breaking of the game's color barrier and the day the Brooklyn Dodgers started him at first base, April 15, 1947. The life of the man who broke baseball's color barrier. Photo: Brooklyn Dodgers infielder Jackie Robinson, April 18, 1948. There was no sophomore jinx for Jackie, he had a solid second season and followed that in 1949 when he was awarded his first National League MVP Award. Credit: AP Photo Jackie Robinson reports to Royals Branch Rickey of the Dodgers organization first met with Jackie Robinson in August 28, 1945.

Robinson signed a contract to play with the Montreal Royals of the International League on October 23, 1945 receiving a $3,500 bonus and $600 per month salary. Robinson reported to the Montreal Royals baseball club at Sanford, Florida, to play for the Dodger farm team for the 1946 season. Credit: AP Photo Jackie Robinson of the Brooklyn Dodgers poses for a portrait circa 1947-1956. Credit: Getty Images/MLB Photos Robinson family portrait Mallie Robinson, center, poses for a family portrait with her children, from left, Mack Robinson, Jackie Robinson, Edgar Robinson, Willa Mae Robinson and Frank Robinson circa 1925 in California. Raised in Pasadena, Jackie Robinson (1919-72) went on to be the first African-American to play American Major League Baseball. Credit: Hulton Archive/Getty Images Basketball player at UCLA Jackie Robinson is seen in his basketball uniform while attending the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). While at UCLA, Robinson played baseball, football, basketball, and track.

Credit: AP Photo Reese, Stanky, Jorgensen From left are Brooklyn Dodgers' John Jorgensen, Pee Wee Reese, Ed Stanky and Jackie Robinson on April 15, 1947 which was Robinson's first day playing for the Dodgers. Credit: AP Photo Branch Rickey Brooklyn Dodgers' president Branch Rickey, right, and star Jackie Robinson confer at the Chicago Baseball Writers' Association annual dinner in Chicago, Ill., January 18, 1948. Robinson won the first MLB Rookie of the Year Award, the award that is named after him today. Credit: AP Photo Robinson, Jackie Jr. and Rachel Brooklyn Dodger baseball star Jackie Robinson holding his young son Jackie Jr. on his lap as he sits with his wife Rachel on front steps of their home in Brooklyn, July 1, 1949. Credit: Getty Images/Nina Leen Stealing home Brooklyn Dodgers' Jackie Robinson steals home successfully as Boston Braves' catcher Bill Salkeld is thrown off-balance on pitcher Bill Voiselle's throw to the plate during the fifth inning of a Boston-Brooklyn game at Ebbets Field in New York, Aug. 22, 1948.

Third baseman Billy Cox, who was at bat, watches Jackie slide. The Braves won 4-3. Credit: AP Photo/Jack Harris Jackie Robinson 1952 Brooklyn Dodger infielder Jackie Robinson poses in May 1952. Robinson had a .311 career batting average and no other player since World War II has stolen home more than Robinson. During his career, the Dodgers played in six World Series and Jackie played in six All-Star games. Credit: AP Photo Pee Wee Reese, Preacher Roe Brooklyn Dodgers from left, Pee Wee Reese, Jackie Robinson, and Preacher Roe are a happy trio in the clubhouse after the Dodgers beat the Yankees 5-3 in the third game of the World Series at Yankee Stadium in New York, Oct. 3, 1952. Credit: AP Photo Stealing home plate Brooklyn Dodgers' Jackie Robinson safely steals home plate under the tag attempt of Yankees catcher Yogi Berra in the eighth inning of the World Series opener Sept. 28, 1955 in New York's Yankee Stadium. With pinch-hitter Frank Kellert at bat, Robinson beat the throw from Yankee pitcher Whitey Ford. Umpire is Bill Summers.

Yankees won the game 6-5, but the Dodgers went on to win their only World Series. Credit: AP Photo/John Rooney Hall of Fame Jackie Robinson, former Brooklyn Dodgers first baseman, holds his plaque at his induction into the Baseball Hall of Fame, in Cooperstown, N.Y, July 23, 1962 Credit: AP Photo Jackie Robinson and CORE Former baseball star Jackie Robinson carries a placard as he joins pickets at the construction site of the Down State Medical Center in Brooklyn, New York City, August 2, 1963. Robinson and members of CORE, the Congress of Racial Equality, demonstrated in an effort to stop construction of publicly financed projects until more jobs were given to blacks. Credit: AP Photo Baseball legend Jackie Robinson poses at the Roosevelt Hotel in New York, January 23, 1971. Credit: AP Photo/Jim Wells Death of Jack Jr. Jackie Robinson looks pensive at his Stamford, Connecticut home, June 30, 1971, as he discusses the death of his son Jack Jr. Jack was killed in an automobile accident.

Credit: AP Photo First ball at World Series 1972 Jackie Robinson is shown as he prepared to throw out the first ball at the second game of the World Series in Cincinnati on October 15, 1972, his last public appearance. At right is Baseball Commissioner Bowie Kuhn. Robinson died from heart problems and diabetes complications on October 24, 1972. Credit: AP Photo Jackie Robinson's grave A single rose with a handwritten note rests at the grave of baseball Hall-of-Famer Jackie Robinson at the Cypress Hill Cemetery in the Queens borough of New York City, April 15, 1997. Credit: AP Photo/Doug Kanter Jackie Robinson Biography (Baseball Player) Died: 24 October 1972 (diabetes) Birthplace: Cairo, Georgia Best known as: The man who broke baseball's color barrier Jackie Robinson was the first African-American to play in baseball's major leagues in the modern era. Only white players were accepted in the major leagues until 1947, when Jackie Robinson was called up to play for the Brooklyn Dodgers. He made his first major league appearance on 15 April 1947.

Robinson was named Rookie of the Year for 1947 and went on to appear in six World Series in ten seasons with the Dodgers (1947-56). Other major league teams soon followed Brooklyn's lead and hired black players of their own. Robinson's stellar play, and his role in breaking the color barrier, led to his 1962 induction as the first African-American in baseball's Hall of Fame. In 1997, on the 50th anniversary of Robinson's first year with the Dodgers, Major League Baseball permanently retired Robinson's uniform number, 42. He is the only baseball player ever to have been so honored. He was posthumously awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by President Ronald Reagan in 1984. Extra credit: Jackie Robinson was mainly a second baseman, though he also played at first and third… The Brooklyn Dodgers moved west and became the Los Angeles Dodgers after the 1957 season… Jackie Robinson attended UCLA, where he lettered in four sports: track, baseball, football and basketball… He served in the U.S.

Army from 1941-44… According to the official site of Robinson’s estate, “Jackie married Rachel Isum, a nursing student he met at UCLA, in 1946.” They had three children: Jackie Jr., Sharon and David. Copyright © 1998-2017 by Who2?, LLC. All rights reserved. Advertisement Advertisement Did Jackie Robinson really break baseball's color barrier? | HowStuffWorks Did Jackie Robinson really break baseball's color barrier? Jackie Robinson talks with Brooklyn Dodgers president Branch Rickey at a team training camp in Vero Beach, Florida, 1949. See other baseball pictures . Curt Gunther/Keystone/Archive Photos/Getty Images For baseball fans, civil rights activists and anyone who has seen the movie "42," it's considered common knowledge that Jackie Robinson broke Major League Baseball's color barrier when he took the field for the Brooklyn Dodgers in 1947. Robinson's emergence in the big leagues is hailed as a pioneering moment, not only in the integration of professional sports, but in the struggle for racial equality in America at large.

Often overlooked in the story of Robinson's crowning achievement, however, are all the non-white players who had already been playing on baseball's biggest stage before he landed in Brooklyn [sources: Dreier , University of Illinois ]. Robinson made history on April 15, 1947, when he started at first base (he later spent most of his career patrolling second base) in a home game at Ebbets Field, Brooklyn, an event widely regarded as the moment when baseball's color barrier was officially shattered. While there was no written rule in place banning black players from suiting up for professional clubs, big league owners had operated under an unwritten agreement to keep African-Americans off their teams since 1889 [sources: Corcoran , Dreier , Regan ]. Up Next Negro Leagues Hall of Fame Members As a four-sport athlete at UCLA who thrived in the Negro Leagues prior to taking up with the Dodgers, this wasn't the first time that Robinson turned heads for his athletic abilities. Nor was it the first time he'd challenged segregation.

In 1944, Robinson was court-martialed after refusing to move to the back of an Army bus in Fort Hood, Texas, where he was stationed as a second lieutenant. He was later acquitted on charges of insubordination and honorably discharged [source: Dreier ]. Robinson's arrival in Brooklyn was largely orchestrated by Branch Rickey , the legendary Dodgers president who had previously built a dynasty with the Cardinals in St. Louis and who is also credited with creating the minor league "farm" system that big league teams use to develop talent to this day [sources: Dreier , The New York Times ]. But Rickey and Robinson were not alone in their effort to desegregate the national pastime. Many other people had been agitating for this in the years prior to 1947. 1 Jackie Robinson - Jackie Robinson broke baseball's color barrier - Pictures - CBS News Next Jackie Robinson 1948 On April 15 of each season, Major League Baseball celebrates Jackie Robinson Day commemorating the breaking of the game's color barrier and the day the Brooklyn Dodgers started him at first base, April 15, 1947. The life of the man who broke baseball's color barrier.

Photo: Brooklyn Dodgers infielder Jackie Robinson, April 18, 1948. There was no sophomore jinx for Jackie, he had a solid second season and followed that in 1949 when he was awarded his first National League MVP Award. Credit: AP Photo Jackie Robinson reports to Royals Branch Rickey of the Dodgers organization first met with Jackie Robinson in August 28, 1945. Robinson signed a contract to play with the Montreal Royals of the International League on October 23, 1945 receiving a $3,500 bonus and $600 per month salary. Robinson reported to the Montreal Royals baseball club at Sanford, Florida, to play for the Dodger farm team for the 1946 season. Credit: AP Photo Jackie Robinson of the Brooklyn Dodgers poses for a portrait circa 1947-1956. Credit: Getty Images/MLB Photos Robinson family portrait Mallie Robinson, center, poses for a family portrait with her children, from left, Mack Robinson, Jackie Robinson, Edgar Robinson, Willa Mae Robinson and Frank Robinson circa 1925 in California.

Raised in Pasadena, Jackie Robinson (1919-72) went on to be the first African-American to play American Major League Baseball. Credit: Hulton Archive/Getty Images Basketball player at UCLA Jackie Robinson is seen in his basketball uniform while attending the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). While at UCLA, Robinson played baseball, football, basketball, and track. Credit: AP Photo Reese, Stanky, Jorgensen From left are Brooklyn Dodgers' John Jorgensen, Pee Wee Reese, Ed Stanky and Jackie Robinson on April 15, 1947 which was Robinson's first day playing for the Dodgers. Credit: AP Photo Branch Rickey Brooklyn Dodgers' president Branch Rickey, right, and star Jackie Robinson confer at the Chicago Baseball Writers' Association annual dinner in Chicago, Ill., January 18, 1948. Robinson won the first MLB Rookie of the Year Award, the award that is named after him today. Credit: AP Photo Robinson, Jackie Jr. and Rachel Brooklyn Dodger baseball star Jackie Robinson holding his young son Jackie Jr. on his lap as he sits with his wife Rachel on front steps of their home in Brooklyn, July 1, 1949.

Credit: Getty Images/Nina Leen Stealing home Brooklyn Dodgers' Jackie Robinson steals home successfully as Boston Braves' catcher Bill Salkeld is thrown off-balance on pitcher Bill Voiselle's throw to the plate during the fifth inning of a Boston-Brooklyn game at Ebbets Field in New York, Aug. 22, 1948. Third baseman Billy Cox, who was at bat, watches Jackie slide. The Braves won 4-3. Credit: AP Photo/Jack Harris Jackie Robinson 1952 Brooklyn Dodger infielder Jackie Robinson poses in May 1952. Robinson had a .311 career batting average and no other player since World War II has stolen home more than Robinson. During his career, the Dodgers played in six World Series and Jackie played in six All-Star games. Credit: AP Photo Pee Wee Reese, Preacher Roe Brooklyn Dodgers from left, Pee Wee Reese, Jackie Robinson, and Preacher Roe are a happy trio in the clubhouse after the Dodgers beat the Yankees 5-3 in the third game of the World Series at Yankee Stadium in New York, Oct. 3, 1952.

Credit: AP Photo Stealing home plate Brooklyn Dodgers' Jackie Robinson safely steals home plate under the tag attempt of Yankees catcher Yogi Berra in the eighth inning of the World Series opener Sept. 28, 1955 in New York's Yankee Stadium. With pinch-hitter Frank Kellert at bat, Robinson beat the throw from Yankee pitcher Whitey Ford. Umpire is Bill Summers. Yankees won the game 6-5, but the Dodgers went on to win their only World Series. Credit: AP Photo/John Rooney Hall of Fame Jackie Robinson, former Brooklyn Dodgers first baseman, holds his plaque at his induction into the Baseball Hall of Fame, in Cooperstown, N.Y, July 23, 1962 Credit: AP Photo Jackie Robinson and CORE Former baseball star Jackie Robinson carries a placard as he joins pickets at the construction site of the Down State Medical Center in Brooklyn, New York City, August 2, 1963. Robinson and members of CORE, the Congress of Racial Equality, demonstrated in an effort to stop construction of publicly financed projects until more jobs were given to blacks.

Credit: AP Photo Baseball legend Jackie Robinson poses at the Roosevelt Hotel in New York, January 23, 1971. Credit: AP Photo/Jim Wells Death of Jack Jr. Jackie Robinson looks pensive at his Stamford, Connecticut home, June 30, 1971, as he discusses the death of his son Jack Jr. Jack was killed in an automobile accident. Credit: AP Photo First ball at World Series 1972 Jackie Robinson is shown as he prepared to throw out the first ball at the second game of the World Series in Cincinnati on October 15, 1972, his last public appearance. At right is Baseball Commissioner Bowie Kuhn. Robinson died from heart problems and diabetes complications on October 24, 1972. Credit: AP Photo Jackie Robinson's grave A single rose with a handwritten note rests at the grave of baseball Hall-of-Famer Jackie Robinson at the Cypress Hill Cemetery in the Queens borough of New York City, April 15, 1997. Credit: AP Photo/Doug Kanter Read More in American History Magazine Subscribe online and save nearly 40%!!!

By mid-November the criticism became so hostile that Rickey’s own family pleaded with him to abandon his crusade for fear that it would destroy his health. The Dodger president refused, speaking only of the excitement and competitive advantage that black players would bring to Brooklyn baseball, while downplaying the moral significance he attached to integration. “The greatest untapped reservoir of raw material in the history of the game is the black race,” he contended. “The Negroes will make us winners for years to come and for that I will happily bear being called a ‘bleeding heart’ and a ‘do-gooder’ and all that humanitarian rot.” Robinson’s first test came during the 1946 preseason, even before he debuted with the Montreal Royals. Rickey named Mississippian Clay Hopper, who had worked for him since 1929, to manage the Royals. There were reports, probably true, that Hopper begged Rickey to reconsider giving him this assignment. But Rickey’s careful handling of Robinson’s jump to the big leagues would seem to suggest that he believed that having a Southerner at the helm of the Montreal club would head off some dissension among the players and that he trusted Hopper to handle any situation that might arise.

Throughout the ’46 season, Robinson endured racist remarks from fans and opposing players and humiliating treatment in the South. By season’s end, the constant pressure and abuse had taken its toll—his hair began to gray, he suffered with chronic stomach trouble, and some thought he was on the brink of a nervous breakdown. Finding himself unable to eat or sleep, he went to a doctor, who concluded he was suffering from stress. “You’re not having a nervous breakdown,” the physician told him. “You’re under a lot of stress. Stay home and don’t read any newspapers, and don’t go to the ballpark for a week.” Jackie, his wife Rachel remembered, stayed home for one day. The problem, she said, “came from his not being able to fight back.” It was, as Rickey had warned him, “the cross that you must bear.” Despite the tension and distractions, Robinson managed to hit for an impressive .349 average and led the Montreal Royals to victory over the Louisville Colonels in the Little World Series. After the final game in that championship series, grateful Royals fans hoisted Robinson onto their shoulders and carried him to the locker room.

Hopper shook his shortstop’s hand and said: “You’re a real ballplayer and a gentleman. It’s been wonderful having you on the team.” Robinson had made his first convert. Because Robinson’s success with Montreal had been so impressive, Rickey assumed that all the Dodgers would demand is promotion to the majors for the 1947 season. “After all,” he reasoned, “Robinson could mean a pennant, and ball players are not averse to cashing World Series checks.” To promote and protect his young black star, Rickey made some additional moves. First, in order to avoid Jim Crow restrictions, he held spring training in Havana, Cuba, instead of Florida. Next, he moved Robinson, an experienced shortstop and second baseman, to first base, where he would be spared physical contact with opposing players who might try to injure him deliberately. Finally, Rickey scheduled a seven-game series between the Dodgers and the Royals in order to showcase Robinson’s talent. “I want you to be a whirling demon against the Dodgers in this series,” Rickey told Robinson. “You have to be so good that the Dodger players themselves are going to want you on their club….I want you to hit that ball.

I want you to get on base and run wild. Steal their pants off. Be the most conspicuous player on the field. The newspapermen from New York will send good stories back about you and help mold favorable public opinion.” Robinson more than obliged, batting .625 and stealing seven bases in the series. But instead of helping him, the performance served only to alienate him from his future teammates, many of whom were Southerners. Alabamian Dixie Walker drafted a petition stating that the players who signed would prefer to be traded than to play with a black teammate. While the team was playing exhibition games in Panama, Walker proceeded to gather signatures from Dodger teammates. Harold “Pee Wee” Reese, although a Kentuckian, refused to sign. It was a tremendously courageous act on his part because, as the team’s shortstop, Reese had more to lose than any other Dodger. “If he can take my job,” Reese insisted, “he’s entitled to it.” When Dodger manager Leo Durocher learned of the petition, he was furious. He had asked Rickey to bring Robinson up to Brooklyn during the previous year’s pennant drive.

At a late-night team meeting, according to Harold Parrott, the Dodger road secretary, Durocher told Walker and the other petitioners that “I don’t care if the guy is yellow or black, or if he has stripes like a zebra. I’m the manager of this team and I say he plays. What’s more, I say he can make us all rich….An’ if any of you can’t use the money, I’ll see that you’re traded.” The rebellion squelched, Rickey announced on April 10, 1947, that Jackie Robinson had officially been signed to play first base for the Brooklyn Dodgers. The noble experiment was in full swing. Of all the major league cities, Brooklyn, with its ethnically diverse and racially mixed neighborhoods, was just the place to break the color barrier. Despite their reputation as “perennial losers”—since the franchise’s establishment in 1883, no Brooklyn team had won a World Series—the Dodgers enjoyed an enduring love affair with their fans. This warm affinity was fostered, in part, by their cramped but colorful ballpark, Ebbets Field, located in the Flatbush section of Brooklyn.

The double-decked grandstands stood only along the foul lines, allowing the fans a special intimacy wit the players. “If you were in a box seat,” said broadcaster Red Barber, “you were so close you were practically an infielder.” Aside from the patchwork collection of local advertisements in left field; the large black scoreboard in right; and the tone-deaf “Dodger Symphony Band” that roamed the grandstand, nothing came between the Dodger and their die-hard fans. When Robinson made his first appearance as a Dodger on April 15, 1947, more than 26,000 fans packed Ebbets Field; reportedly some 14,000 of those were African American. The afternoon was cold and rainy, and Robinson went hitless. Nonetheless, the sight of a black man on a major league diamond during a regular season game moved the crowd so deeply that they cheered the Dodgers on to a 5-3 victory over the Boston Braves. Every move the 28-year-old rookie made seemed to be greeted with the chant: “Jackie! Jackie!

Jackie!” It seemed as if baseball had finally shed its three-quarters of a century of hypocrisy to become truly deserving of the title “national pastime.” When the Philadelphia Phillies arrived in Brooklyn a week later, however, all hopes that integration would come peaceably were shattered. In one of the lowest moments ever in baseball history, the Phillies, led by their Southern manager, Ben Chapman, launched a tirade of racial epithets during the pregame batting practice. And the jeering did not let up throughout the entire three-game series. Two weeks later, when the Dodgers traveled to the so-called City of Brotherly Love, Chapman and his Phillies picked up where they left off, warning the Dodger players that they would contract diseases if they touched Robinson and indulging in even more personal racial slurs. Robinson’s less-than-stellar hitting in the series only added to the Phillies’ contention that he did not belong in the majors and was a ploy to attract blacks to Dodger games and make more money for Rickey. After the second game of the series, angry Dodger fans launched a full-scale protest with the National League’s president, Ford Frick, who responded by ordering Chapman and the Phillies to stop their verbal assault immediately.

In fact, Chapman probably would have lost his job over the incident, if Robinson had not agreed to pose with him for a conciliatory newspaper photograph. Under duress, the Phillies manager agreed to stand next to the Dodger rookie. “Ben extended his hand,” Harold Parrott recalled, “smiling broadly as if they had been buddy-buddy for a lifetime. Robinson reached out and grasped it. The flicker of a smile crept across his face as the photographer snapped away, getting several shots. Years later Robinson admitted that the incessant abuse during those games with the Phillies almost led him to the breaking point. As he described it: “For one wild and rage-crazed minute I thought, ‘To hell with Mr. Rickey’s noble experiment. It’s clear that it won’t succeed….What a glorious, cleansing thing it would be to let go.’ To hell with the image of the patient black freak I was supposed to create. I could throw down my bat, stride over to the Phillies dugout, grab one of those white sons of bitches and smash his teeth in with my despised black fist. Then I could walk away from it and I’d never become a sports star.

But my son could tell his son some day what his daddy could have been if he hadn’t been too much of a man.” The experience with the Phillies revealed the shocking severity of the racism that existed in baseball. At the same time, however, Robinson’s tremendous restraint in the face of such ugly prejudice served to rally his teammates around him and the cause of integration. Eddie Stanky, one of those who had signed the petition against Robinson joining the team, became so angered by the Phillies’ relentless abuse that he challenged them to “yell at somebody who can answer back.” Soon after, before a game in Cincinnati, the Reds’ players taunted Pee Wee Reese about playing with a black teammate. The Dodger shortstop walked over to Robinson and, in a firm show of support, placed his arm around the first baseman’s shoulders. As the season unfolded, Dodger support for Robinson strengthened in response to the admirable way he handled all the adversity. Opposing pitchers threw at his head and ribs, while infielders would spit in his face if he was involved in a close play on the base paths. And the hate mail was unending. But through it all, Robinson persevered. He even managed to keep a sense of humor.

Before one game in Cincinnati, when the Dodgers learned that their first baseman’s life had been threatened, one teammate suggested that all the players wear Robinson’s number “42” on their backs to confuse the assailant. “Okay with me,” responded the rookie. “Paint your faces black and run pigeon-toed too!” Even the white baseball establishment began to embrace the Dodger infielder. In May of 1947, when Ford Frick learned of the St. Louis Cardinals’ intention to instigate a league-wide strike by walking off the ball diamond in a scheduled game against the integrated Dodgers, he vowed to suspend their ringleaders if they carried out their plan. “I don’t care if I wreck the National League for five years,” he declared. “This is the United States of America, and one citizen has as much right to play as another. The National League will go down the line with Robinson whatever the consequence.” The conspiracy died on the spot.

When the season ended, the Sporting News, which had gone on record earlier as opposing the integration of baseball because “There is not a single Negro player with major league possibilities,” named Robinson the National League’s Rookie of the Year for his impressive performance that season—29 stolen bases, 12 home runs, 42 successful bunt hits, and a .297 batting average. Those efforts helped the Dodgers to capture a pennant, and on September 23, jubilant Brooklyn fans cheered their first baseman with a “Jackie Robinson Day” at Ebbets Field. In addition to a new car and other gifts, Robinson received tributes for his contribution to racial equality. Song-and-dance man Bill “Bojangles” Robinson, one of the guest speakers, told the crowd: “I’m 69 years old but never thought I’d live to see the day when I’d stand face-to-face with Ty Cobb in Technicolor.” The Dodgers forced the New York Yankees to a seventh and deciding game in the World Series. And when all was said and done, no amount of hate mail or verbal and psychological abuse could tarnish the indisputable fact that Jackie Robinson was an exceptional baseball player.

He belonged in the major leagues. Robinson’s greatest accomplishment, however, was the inspiration that he provided for other African Americans, both in and out of baseball. Thousands of blacks came to watch him play, setting new attendance records in such cities as Chicago and Pittsburgh. Even in St. Louis, Cincinnati, and Philadelphia, where the opposing teams were the most hostile toward the Dodger rookie, black fans would arrive on chartered buses called “Jackie Robinson Specials,” having traveled hundreds of miles just to see him play. Ed Charles, a black youngster from the Deep South who went on to play in the major leagues himself, remembered the thrill of seeing his childhood hero for the first time. “I sat in the segregated section of the ball park and watched Jackie,” he said. “And I finally believed what I read in the papers—that one of us had made it. When the game was over we kids followed Jackie to the train station. When the train pulled out, we ran down the tracks listening for the sounds as far as we could. And when we couldn’t hear it any longer, we stopped and put our ears to the track so we could feel the vibrations of that train carrying Jackie Robinson.

We wanted to be part of him as long as we could.” Indeed, Robinson had jolted the national consciousness in a profound way. Until 1947 all of baseball’s heroes had been white men. Suddenly, there was a black baseball star who could hit, bunt, steal, and field with the best of them. His style of play was nothing new in the Negro Leagues, but in the white majors, it was innovative and exciting. Robinson made things happen on the base paths. If he got on first, he stole second. If he could not steal third, he would distract the pitcher by dancing off second in order to advance. And then he would steal home. The name of the game was to score runs without a hit, something quite different from the “power hitting” strategy that had characterized major league baseball.

During the next decade, this new style of play would come to be known as “Dodger Baseball.” Before the ’47 season was over, Branch Rickey had signed 16 additional Negro Leaguers, including catcher and future three-time Most Valuable Player Roy Campanella; pitcher Don Newcombe, who in 1956 would win 27 games; and second baseman Jim Gilliam, like Robinson always a threat to steal a base. Together with Robinson and such white stars as Pee Wee Reese, Edwin “Duke” Snider, Gil Hodges, and Carl Erskine, these men would form the nucleus of a team that would capture six pennants and, at long last, in 1955, a world championship, before the Dodgers left Brooklyn for the West Coast at the end of the 1957 season. By 1959, every team in major league baseball was integrated, one of every five players being of African-American descent. When Rickey talked of trading Robinson to the New York Giants after the ’56 season, the pioneering ballplayer chose to retire at the age of 38.

His career totals, which included 1,518 hits, more than 200 stolen bases, and a lifetime batting average of .311, earned him a place in the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 1962, the first African American so honored. He continued to fight actively for civil rights long after his baseball career had ended, supporting Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and his call for the peaceful integration of American society. Despite his tremendous accomplishments on and off the baseball field, Jackie Robinson, with characteristic humility, never gave himself much credit. A year before his untimely death in 1972, he reflected on his struggle to break baseball’s color barrier. “I was proud,” Robinson admitted, “yet I was uneasy. Proud to be in the hurricane eye of a significant breakthrough and to be used to prove that a sport can’t call itself ‘national’ if blacks are barred from it. But uneasy because I knew that I was still a black man in a white world.

And so I continue to ask myself, ‘What have I really done for my people?’” The answer was evident to everyone but him; for by appealing to the moral conscience of the nation, Jackie Robinson had given a young generation of blacks a chance at the “American Dream” and in the process taught many white Americans to respect others regardless of the color of their skin. More Jackie Robinson Articles Daily Quiz for April 7, 2011 Baseball great Jackie Robinson became a vice president for this coffee company after he retired from baseball.

Question: Who broke baseball's "color barrier" in 1947?
Answer: Jackie Robinson