Jackie Robinson Essay Outline

Introduction

“I’m not concerned with your liking or disliking me, All I ask is that you respect me as a human being”(JackieRobinson.com).This was once said by a man named Jackie Robinson, Jackie was a very great and multi-talented man that changed baseball history forever.

Childhood

Jackie Roosevelt Robinson was born on January 31st, 1919 in Cairo, Georgia. He was the youngest of five children (Mack, Edgar, Willa Mae, and Frank).Jackie’s father, Jerry hoped for a better life and deserted his family when Jackie was just six months old. Mallie ,Jackie’s mother, moved her and her children to Pasadena California to make things better for her family.

The Robinsons were one of the few black families in their new neighborhood and unfortunately faced harsh discrimination. Since the kids were often harassed ,they released stress and frustration through sports and all children were above-average athletes. Jackie got into sports mostly because of his oldest brother Mack. He always had to prove himself worthy to play on the fields with the bigger kids.Since Jackie was a good baseball player and his family was poor,kids often bribed him to play on their team by offereing him a dollar or a part of their lunches and if he got money he woukd save it and bring it home to his family.(Dingle 9)

Schooling & Military

In middle school Jackie started falling into the wrong crowd,he eventually joined the “Pepper Street Gang” a agroup of multi-cultural group of rebels that started trouble through the neighborhood and Jackie soon became there leader.Eventually,Jackie and his friends got into more trouble than intended.They got caught swimming in a local lake and was then esorted to jail at gunpoint by the sheriff.After being kept and interrogated un...

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....After classes Jackie soon received a new rank and tried helping his fellow black soldiers after hearing multiple complaints about not many seats in a resting area.

Jackie proved to the men he could get the seating situation fixed and he did after a heated argument with the provost marshall.After that he got transferred to Fort Hood in Texas,deep in the south where the black soldiers called “The Hellhole”.Soon after being there Jackie got on a bus and started a conversation with the wife of one of his friends and sat in the front with her.The bus driver caught a quick glimpse of the two and thought the fair skinned woman was white and told Jackie to get away from her,Jackie refused.At the end of the bus ride,the driver told military police he was causing trouble and the incident got out of hand,so Jackie was finally released with honorable discharge(Dingle 21).