Jackie Robinson Case
You can hate a man for many reasons. Color is not one of them” (Newman para 8). When people hear the name Jackie Robinson, they think one thing: the first African American to play Major League Baseball. However, Jackie proved that he is much more than that. While Jackie Robinson is best known for “breaking the color barrier” in baseball, his courageousness, integrity and willingness to fight for civil rights and the equality for all African Americans makes him one of the most influential people in history.
Jackie Robinson was born in Cairo, Georgia on January 13, 1919. His grandfather had been born into slavery and his parents lived in a “newer, more sophisticated kind of slavery.” Jerrie, Jackie’s father, often complained about being a farmer. Six months after Robinson was born, his father abandoned the family and left Jackie’s mother, Mallie, to raise five children on her own (Duckett 15). She moved the family to Pasadena, California, where her brother lived. After raising enough money, the family moved into a house located on Pepper Street, which was a predominately white neighborhood. Robinson was eight years old when he first faced racial trouble and he soon joined the Pepper Street gang that consisted of black, Japanese, and Mexican kids (Duckett 18). Two very important influences in Robinson’s life, Carl Anderson, a mechanic who worked in a nearby shop, and Reverend Karl Downs, the minister of the Robinson family’s church, convinced Jackie that he did not belong in a gang. They showed him that he was not only hurting himself by being in a gang, but his mother too. After leaving the gang, Robinson discovered a new way to fill his free time. He started to play sports.
Jackie attended John Muir Technical High, also known as Muir Tech, where he succeeded in many different sports including baseball, football, track, and basketball. Robinson often found himself being singled out by other players and that he was “the best man to beat” (Duckett 21). After graduating from Muir Tech, Jackie followed the footsteps of his older brother and attended Pasadena Junior College where he played the same four sports. In just one day, Robinson made local history in two different cities by setting a new record in the broad jump in the morning and winning a baseball championship in the afternoon. His successful athletic career earned him a lot of publicity and he started to receive scholarships from many different schools. He decided to attend the University of California Los Angeles so he could stay closer to home. He continued playing the same sports and became UCLA’s first four-letter varsity athlete. Robinson decided to leave UCLA after two years because he was convinced that “no amount of education would help a black man get a job” (Duckett 23). A few months later, World War II broke out and in May of 1942, he was drafted into the Army and sent to Fort Riley Kansas for training.
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