Jackie Robinson: Breaking the Racial Barriers Essay -- Robinson Histor

Jackie Robinson Breaking the Racial BarriersOn July 23, 1962, in the attract village of Cooperstown, New York, four new members were inducted into baseballs planetary house of Fame. As they gathered around the wooden platform, the fans reminisced about Americas national pastime. Edd Roush and Bill McKechnie, sixty-eight and seventy-four years old respectively, were dickens of the inductees that day (Robinson 142). They were old-timers chosen by the veterans committee. Bob gent and Jackie Robinson, both forty-two, were youngsters by comparison. According to the rules of the Hall of Fame, a player must be retired for five dollar bill years before he can be considered for induction. Both Feller and Robinson were elected in the first year they were eligible (141).As Robinson receive his plaque to sign on his place among the greats in the Hall of Fame, he said, Ive been riding on cloud number nine since the election, and I set outt think Ill ever come down. Today everything is d espatch (Robinson 142). After the induction ceremony, an exhibition game between the Milwaukee Braves and the New York Yankees was to take place at Doubleday Field, where the shoot a line had its beginnings. A sudden thunderstorm delay the game, and after an hours wait it was cancelled. At this same time, picketers in the streets of Harlem were carrying signs saying, Jackie, we love you as a ballplayer, but not as a spokesman for the Negro locomote (143).Just two days earlier at a banquet in the Waldorf Astoria Hotel in New York City, many people had paid $25 a plate to show their admiration for Jackie as both a ballplayer and a representative of the Negro race as well. whatever of the most distinguished figures in the nation were present this day and their kudos was loud and long (Mann 187). Jackie had accepted without hesitation a challenge to break a prevailing color barrier in the national sport of America with complete knowledge of how much depended on him. Few manpower ha d ever faced such competitive odds when becoming a player in organized baseball. Despite criticism and opposition, Jack Roosevelt Robinson had very come a long way from his poor beginnings as the grandson of slaves in Cairo, Georgia, to breaking the racial barriers in major league baseball by becoming its first black athlete and achieving hall of fame status.Jackie Robinsons childishness was a struggle in family and financ... ...s and coaches can now be institute in the dugout and a few black managers on ternion base. However, the great Dodger would most likely have kept force to see more racial diversity in baseball, particularly among the executive ranks. The Hall of Fame second baseman was never satisfied with second best.Works CitedBontemps, Arna. known Negro Athletes. New York Dodd, Mead and Company, 1964Brown, Avonie. Jackie Robinson, Dodgers 42. The Afro-American Newspaper Company of Baltimore, Inc., 1997. http//www.afroam.org/history/Robinson/intro.htmlRobinson, Jacki e. I Never Had It Made. New Jersey The Ecco Press, 1995.Smith, Robert. Pioneers of Baseball. Boston Little, Brown, 1978.Soul of the Game. The Sporting News, 2000. http//www.sportingnews.com/features/jackie/TIME. commodious People of the 20th Century. New York Time Inc. Home Entertainment, 1996Walker, Sam. How Blacks View Sports in Post-Robinson Era.(cover story) Christian Science Monitor 1997 1Young, A.S. Doc. Negros Firsts in Sports. Chicago Johnson publish Company, Inc., 1963