by Lori Lakin Hutcherson (@lakinhutcherson)
Seventy five years ago today, Jackie Robinson made sports and U.S. history when he took to the infield as a Brooklyn Dodger against the Boston Braves and integrated Major League Baseball.
To read about Robinson, read on. To hear about him, press PLAY:
[You can subscribe to the Good Black News Daily Drop Podcast via Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Google Podcasts, rss.com or create your own RSS Feed. Or listen every day here on the main page. Full transcript below]:
Hey, this is Lori Lakin Hutcherson, founder and editor in chief of goodblacknews.org, here to share with you a daily drop of Good Black News for Friday, April 15th, 2022, based on the “A Year of Good Black News Page-A-Day Calendar” published by Workman Publishing.
#Onthisday seventy-five years ago, Jackie Robinson sprinted right over the Major League Baseball color line when he took to the infield to play first base for the Brooklyn Dodgers.
Robinson earned the first ever MLB “Rookie of the Year” Award that same year, and in 1949 he became the first Black player to win the National League MVP Award.
In 1956, after six straight years as an All Star, Robinson led the Dodgers to a World Series Championship, proving all haters, detractors, and racists wrong with his undeniably stellar statistics and play. To quote Robinson:
“I’m not concerned with your liking or disliking me. All I ask is that you respect me as a human being.”
To learn more about Georgia native and U.S. Army veteran Robinson, check out the official website jackierobinson.com for information, stats, interviews, photos and more, read I Never Had it Made: An Autobiography of Jackie Robinson, originally published in 1972.
Also check out the 2013 film 42, starring Chadwick Boseman that’s currently streaming on HBO Max, and the 2016 documentary Jackie Robinson by Ken Burns, which is on DVD or somewhere on PBS.
Additionally, consider donating to the Jackie Robinson Foundation at jackierobinson.org, which offers financial aid to Black college students under its JRF Scholars program, and also supports job placement and the development of leadership and life skills.
The site also provides updates on the upcoming opening this year of the Jackie Robinson Museum in New York.
This has been a daily drop of Good Black News, written, produced and hosted by yours truly, Lori Lakin Hutcherson. Beats provided by freebeats.io and produced by White Hot.
If you like these Daily Drops, follow us on Apple, Google Podcasts, RSS.com, Amazon, Spotify or wherever you get your podcasts. Leave a rating or review, share links to your favorite episodes, or go old school and tell a friend.
For more Good Black News, check out goodblacknews.org or search and follow @goodblacknews anywhere on social.
Sources:
- https://www.biography.com/athlete/jackie-robinson
- https://jackierobinson.org
- https://baseballhall.org/hall-of-famers/robinson-jackie
- https://www.mentalfloss.com/article/50059/42-facts-about-jackie-robinson
- https://baseballhall.org/discover-more/stories/baseball-history/jackies-own-words
- https://www.loc.gov/collections/jackie-robinson-baseball/articles-and-essays/baseball-the-color-line-and-jackie-robinson/meet-the-press/
- https://youtu.be/oTsVeTz3pOY (LA Dodgers remembering Jackie Robinson)
- https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mr5P8dcn3n4 (doc trailer)
(amazon links are paid links)