Brief Summary Of Jackie Jackson's Life Story

Jackie Robinson was born on January 31, 1919 in Georgia. On this day, a legend arrived. Jackie was raised by his mother, and his mother alone. His father left before Jackie was born, and he didn’t remember one thing about him. Jackie had many siblings, brothers and sisters. Jackie had an older brother named Matthew, who was also very athletic. Jackie’s mother tried the best she could to raise these boys right, and teach them that no matter what the whites called them...they were special. As time went on, Jackie began to have a great love for sports. He admired basketball, track, football, and of course the wonderful baseball. He did very well in all of these sports and won many trophies. He went on to play football for the Honolulu

He never set foot in combat, however. He was arrested because he wouldn’t give up his seat on a segregated bus. He received an honorable discharge, and was sent home. This was just the start of something much bigger. This was the start of a black man changing the segregated world into a world where we could all come together. Jackie came home and married Rachel. A girl that he’d had his eye on for a long time, and knew that he would one day marry. A couple months later, they had a beautiful son. Jackie promised himself and his son that he would not be like his own father. He was always going to be there for him. He told himself that his son was going to remember him...and he hoped that he would only remember good and happy things. Jackie was offered a spot on the Brooklyn Dodgers team. Jackie had been a part of many black baseball leagues, but this would be the first white team he would be on. Branch Rickey (the president of the baseball team) knew that Jackie Robinson would be the man for the job. Rickey made sure that Jackie wouldn’t lose his temper at the first sight or racial abuse. So before offering Jackie the contract, he began using racial slurs to see how Jackie would react. Jackie asked Rickey if he just wanted someone without the guts to fight back. Rickey responded with “No, I want someone WITH the guts NOT to fight

The players are not going to be very happy with this situation either. Some of the players started a petition, saying that they would not play if the “black baseball player” was on the field. The coach talked some sense into them, saying that it doesn’t matter what color he is, just how well he plays. Most of the men accepted Jackie, but others still didn’t work well with him. Since the players wouldn’t work with him, THEY were the ones that got traded. Jackie went through a lot. Coaches and players would say awful things off to the side, and Jackie would just have to block them out. Players would purposely throw balls at his head and step on him when they ran through the bases. Jackie never once fought back. He would just try and beat them in baseball. Jackie knew that if he fought back, the whites would complain about how they should have never let an angry black man onto the field. He couldn’t let them have that sort of power over