Chapter Three
Chapter three on the integration of Major League Baseball
Informal Race Man
Seth Thomas
It was no accident that Branch Rickey decided to pick Jackie Robinson. His wife would remember that what first attracted her to Robinson was that he "walked straight, he held his head up and he was proud of not just his color, but his people." The same qualities caught Mr. Rickey's attention. Early on in his military career (in which he would become a second lieutenant), he refused to move from the front of the bus. In his Negro League days, he had become famous on the Kansas City Monarchs for certain "Race man" activities, Buck O'Neil remembered:
We'd been going for thirty years to this filling station in Oklahoma where we
would buy gas. We had two fifty gallon tanks on that [bus]. We'd buy the gas,
but we couldn't use the rest room.
Jackie said, "I'm going to the rest room."
The man said, "Boy, you can't go to that rest room."
Jackie said, "take the hose out of the tank. Take the hose out of the tank."
[Now,] this guy ain't gonna sell one hundred gallons of gas in a whole year.
"If we can't go to the rest room, we won't get any gas here. We'll get it someplace else."
The man said, "Well, you boys can go to the rest room, but don't stay long."
So, actually, he started something there. Now, every place we would go we wanted to know first could we use the rest room. If we couldn't use the rest room-no gas. (Burns 285-86)
Jackie Robinson is most remembered for the stir he created when he played for the Brooklyn Dodgers. People often times forget, however, the ripple effects of that and what he did when he retired early in 1957. His wife Rachel Robinson tries to get people to remember him for more than baseball. "In remembering him, I tend to de-emphasize him as a ball player and emphasize him as an informal civil rights leader" she says (The National Archives, online). Both caused civil rights to jump years ahead, possibly even decades.
The first noticeable difference when Jackie Robinson arrived was the change in who came to baseball games. Before Robinson, the segregation on the field transferred into a pseudo-segregation in the stands with most of the fans coming to ball games being white. On April 15, 1947, the day of Jackie Robinson's introduction to Major League Baseball, there were 26,623 people in attendance, of which 14,000 were said to be black (Burns 291). Soon, owners and managers realized that not only was there great talent in the African American baseball community, but also a lucrative fan base could be counted on showing up. As is the case for owners, where there is money there is a way, and there was money to be made.
The players were the next to be changed in the process of integration. Although horror stories surrounded Robinson as he was slid into, thrown at and jeered at from both benches, there were also moments like when Pee Wee Reese publicly put his arm around Jackie. But the changes in attitudes were not just a short phase lasting the nine years of Robinson's career, but a change that lasted. When Branch Rickey died on December 9, 1965, many attended his funeral. Included in those who mourned was Bobby Bragan, a former Dodger catcher who signed the petition to keep Robinson off the team. A reporter asked him why he came, to which he said, "Branch Rickey made me a better man" (Burns 398).
As was evidenced by the changing crowds at baseball stadiums everywhere, public opinion was shifting. And as so often is the case with public opinion, the government took notice. It had not even been a decade since Robinson last played on Ebbets Field when the Civil Rights Act was passed in 1964. This piece of legislation is often hailed as the most important U.S. law on civil rights since Reconstruction (Encyclopedia of Britannica Online).
Granted Jackie Robinson was not responsible directly for government working harder and harder on civil rights, he certainly did his share. There are many letters in the National Archives that Jackie Robinson sent to political figures. In a letter sent to President Eisenhower on May 13, 1958, he criticized him for telling African Americans to have patience:
I respectfully remind you sir, that we have been the most patient of all people. When you said we must have self-respect, I wondered how we could have self- respect and remain patient considering the treatment accorded us through the years.
17 million Negroes cannot do as you suggest and wait for the hearts of men to change. We want to enjoy now the rights that we feel we are entitled to as Americans. This we cannot do unless we pursue aggressively goals which all other Americans achieved over 150 years ago. (The National Archives, online)
Robinson wrote many of these sort of letters, attended numerous meetings to do with race, organized protests and marches, and went down to Mississippi and Alabam during tense times.
Jackie Robinson was a remarkable "informal civil rights leader" as his wife said (National Archives). He had connections with many of America's key civil rights figures, such as Martin Luther King Jr., and he was a firm believer that rights had to be won nonviolently. In a telegraph to President Johnson on March 9, 1965 he pleaded with the President to take matters in Alabama into his own hands, saying "American cannot afford this" (The National Archives, online). Robinson was also the spokesperson for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and frequently appeared with Martin Luther King Jr. (Encyclopedia Britannica Online). When Branch Rickey told Robinson that he would change America forever, he was being conservative.
On the 50th anniversary of Jackie Robinson entering the Majors (1997), Major League Baseball retired his jersey number of 42. It was the first time that a number was retired across all of MLB, and not team specific. With every team in the Majors having players who are not caucasian, it represented an appreciation of not just Robinson, but also of how he changed the game.
Informal Race Man
Seth Thomas
It was no accident that Branch Rickey decided to pick Jackie Robinson. His wife would remember that what first attracted her to Robinson was that he "walked straight, he held his head up and he was proud of not just his color, but his people." The same qualities caught Mr. Rickey's attention. Early on in his military career (in which he would become a second lieutenant), he refused to move from the front of the bus. In his Negro League days, he had become famous on the Kansas City Monarchs for certain "Race man" activities, Buck O'Neil remembered:
We'd been going for thirty years to this filling station in Oklahoma where we
would buy gas. We had two fifty gallon tanks on that [bus]. We'd buy the gas,
but we couldn't use the rest room.
Jackie said, "I'm going to the rest room."
The man said, "Boy, you can't go to that rest room."
Jackie said, "take the hose out of the tank. Take the hose out of the tank."
[Now,] this guy ain't gonna sell one hundred gallons of gas in a whole year.
"If we can't go to the rest room, we won't get any gas here. We'll get it someplace else."
The man said, "Well, you boys can go to the rest room, but don't stay long."
So, actually, he started something there. Now, every place we would go we wanted to know first could we use the rest room. If we couldn't use the rest room-no gas. (Burns 285-86)
Jackie Robinson is most remembered for the stir he created when he played for the Brooklyn Dodgers. People often times forget, however, the ripple effects of that and what he did when he retired early in 1957. His wife Rachel Robinson tries to get people to remember him for more than baseball. "In remembering him, I tend to de-emphasize him as a ball player and emphasize him as an informal civil rights leader" she says (The National Archives, online). Both caused civil rights to jump years ahead, possibly even decades.
The first noticeable difference when Jackie Robinson arrived was the change in who came to baseball games. Before Robinson, the segregation on the field transferred into a pseudo-segregation in the stands with most of the fans coming to ball games being white. On April 15, 1947, the day of Jackie Robinson's introduction to Major League Baseball, there were 26,623 people in attendance, of which 14,000 were said to be black (Burns 291). Soon, owners and managers realized that not only was there great talent in the African American baseball community, but also a lucrative fan base could be counted on showing up. As is the case for owners, where there is money there is a way, and there was money to be made.
The players were the next to be changed in the process of integration. Although horror stories surrounded Robinson as he was slid into, thrown at and jeered at from both benches, there were also moments like when Pee Wee Reese publicly put his arm around Jackie. But the changes in attitudes were not just a short phase lasting the nine years of Robinson's career, but a change that lasted. When Branch Rickey died on December 9, 1965, many attended his funeral. Included in those who mourned was Bobby Bragan, a former Dodger catcher who signed the petition to keep Robinson off the team. A reporter asked him why he came, to which he said, "Branch Rickey made me a better man" (Burns 398).
As was evidenced by the changing crowds at baseball stadiums everywhere, public opinion was shifting. And as so often is the case with public opinion, the government took notice. It had not even been a decade since Robinson last played on Ebbets Field when the Civil Rights Act was passed in 1964. This piece of legislation is often hailed as the most important U.S. law on civil rights since Reconstruction (Encyclopedia of Britannica Online).
Granted Jackie Robinson was not responsible directly for government working harder and harder on civil rights, he certainly did his share. There are many letters in the National Archives that Jackie Robinson sent to political figures. In a letter sent to President Eisenhower on May 13, 1958, he criticized him for telling African Americans to have patience:
I respectfully remind you sir, that we have been the most patient of all people. When you said we must have self-respect, I wondered how we could have self- respect and remain patient considering the treatment accorded us through the years.
17 million Negroes cannot do as you suggest and wait for the hearts of men to change. We want to enjoy now the rights that we feel we are entitled to as Americans. This we cannot do unless we pursue aggressively goals which all other Americans achieved over 150 years ago. (The National Archives, online)
Robinson wrote many of these sort of letters, attended numerous meetings to do with race, organized protests and marches, and went down to Mississippi and Alabam during tense times.
Jackie Robinson was a remarkable "informal civil rights leader" as his wife said (National Archives). He had connections with many of America's key civil rights figures, such as Martin Luther King Jr., and he was a firm believer that rights had to be won nonviolently. In a telegraph to President Johnson on March 9, 1965 he pleaded with the President to take matters in Alabama into his own hands, saying "American cannot afford this" (The National Archives, online). Robinson was also the spokesperson for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and frequently appeared with Martin Luther King Jr. (Encyclopedia Britannica Online). When Branch Rickey told Robinson that he would change America forever, he was being conservative.
On the 50th anniversary of Jackie Robinson entering the Majors (1997), Major League Baseball retired his jersey number of 42. It was the first time that a number was retired across all of MLB, and not team specific. With every team in the Majors having players who are not caucasian, it represented an appreciation of not just Robinson, but also of how he changed the game.