document_title: History of mobile phones

question_text: who made the first mobile phone in the world

question_tokens: who made the first mobile phone in the world

text: History of mobile phones

text: Predecessors[edit]

text: Before the devices existed that are now referred to as mobile phones or cell phones, there were some precursors. In 1908, a Professor Albert Jahnke and the Oakland Transcontinental Aerial Telephone and Power Company claimed to have developed a wireless telephone. They were accused of fraud and the charge was then dropped, but they do not seem to have proceeded with production.[2] Beginning in 1918, the German railroad system tested wireless telephony on military trains between Berlin and Zossen.[3] In 1924, public trials started with telephone connection on trains between Berlin and Hamburg. In 1925, the company Zugtelephonie A. G. was founded to supply train telephony equipment and, in 1926, telephone service in trains of the Deutsche Reichsbahn and the German mail service on the route between Hamburg and Berlin was approved and offered to first-class travelers.[4]

text: In 1907, the English caricaturist Lewis Baumer published a cartoon in Punch magazine entitled "Forecasts for 1907" in which he showed a man and a woman in London's Hyde Park each separately engaged in gambling and dating on wireless telephony equipment.[5] Then, in 1926, the artist Karl Arnold created a visionary cartoon about the use of mobile phones in the street, in the picture "wireless telephony", published in the German satirical magazine Simplicissimus.[6]

text: The portrayal of a Utopia of mobile phone in literature dates back to the year 1931. It is found in Erich Kästner's children's book The 35th of May, or Conrad's Ride to the South Seas:

text:
“
A gentleman who rode along the sidewalk in front of them, suddenly stepped off the conveyor belt, pulled a phone from his coat pocket, spoke a number into it and shouted: "Gertrude, listen, I'll be an hour late for lunch because I want to go to the laboratory. Goodbye, sweetheart!" Then he put his pocket phone away again, stepped back on the conveyor belt, started reading a book...
”

— Erich Kästner

text: The Second World War made military use of radio telephony links. Hand-held radio transceivers have been available since the 1940s. Mobile telephones for automobiles became available from some telephone companies in the 1940s. Early devices were bulky, consumed high power, and the network supported only a few simultaneous conversations. Modern cellular networks allow automatic and pervasive use of mobile phones for voice and data communications.

text: In the United States, engineers from Bell Labs began work on a system to allow mobile users to place and receive telephone calls from automobiles, leading to the inauguration of mobile service on 17 June 1946 in St. Louis, Missouri. Shortly after, AT&T offered Mobile Telephone Service. A wide range of mostly incompatible mobile telephone services offered limited coverage area and only a few available channels in urban areas. The introduction of cellular technology, which allowed re-use of frequencies many times in small adjacent areas covered by relatively low powered transmitters, made widespread adoption of mobile telephones economically feasible.

text: One of the earliest fictional descriptions of a mobile phone was the 1948 science fiction novel Space Cadet by Robert Heinlein. The protagonist, who has just traveled to Colorado from his home in Des Moines, receives a call from his father on a pocket telephone. Before going to space he decides to ship the telephone home "since it was limited by its short range to the neighborhood of an earth-side [i.e. terrestrial] relay office." Ten years later, an essay by Arthur C. Clarke envisioned a "personal transceiver, so small and compact that every man carries one." He wrote: "the time will come when we will be able to call a person anywhere on Earth merely by dialing a number." Such a device would also, in Clarke's vision, include means for global positioning so that "no one need ever again be lost." Later, in Profiles of the Future, he predicted the advent of such a device taking place in the mid-1980s.[7] U.S. TV series Get Smart (1965-1970) depicted spy gadgets with mobile telephones concealed in random objects, including shoes.

text: In the USSR, Leonid Kupriyanovich, an engineer from Moscow, in 1957-1961 developed and presented a number of experimental models of handheld mobile phones. The weight of one model, presented in 1961, was only 70 g and could fit on a palm.[8][9] However, in the USSR the decision at first to develop the system of the automobile "Altai" phone was made.[10]

text: In 1965, Bulgarian company "Radioelektronika" presented on the Inforga-65 international exhibition in Moscow the mobile automatic phone combined with a base station. Solutions of this phone were based on a system developed by Leonid Kupriyanovich. One base station, connected to one telephone wire line, could serve up to 15 customers.[11]

text: The advances in mobile telephony can be traced in successive generations from the early "0G" services like MTS and its successor Improved Mobile Telephone Service, to first-generation (1G) analog cellular network, second-generation (2G) digital cellular networks, third-generation (3G) broadband data services to the state-of-the-art, fourth-generation (4G) native-IP networks.

text: Early services[edit]

text: MTS[edit]

text: In 1949, AT&T commercialized Mobile Telephone Service. From its start in St. Louis, Missouri, in 1946, AT&T introduced Mobile Telephone Service to one hundred towns and highway corridors by 1948. Mobile Telephone Service was a rarity with only 5,000 customers placing about 30,000 calls each week. Calls were set up manually by an operator and the user had to depress a button on the handset to talk and release the button to listen. The call subscriber equipment weighed about 80 lb.[12]

text: Subscriber growth and revenue generation were hampered by the constraints of the technology. Because only three radio channels were available, only three customers in any given city could make mobile telephone calls at one time.[13] Mobile Telephone Service was expensive, costing 15 USD per month, plus 0.30 to 0.40 USD per local call, equivalent to about 176 USD per month and 3.50 to 4.75 per call in 2012 USD.[12]

text: In the UK, there was also a vehicle-based system called "Post Office Radiophone Service,"[14] which was launched around the city of Manchester in 1959, and although it required callers to speak to an operator, it was possible to be put through to any subscriber in Great Britain. The service was extended to London in 1965 and other major cities in 1972.

text: IMTS[edit]

text: AT&T introduced the first major improvement to mobile telephony in 1965, giving the improved service the obvious name of Improved Mobile Telephone Service. IMTS used additional radio channels, allowing more simultaneous calls in a given geographic area, introduced customer dialing, eliminating manual call setup by an operator, and reduced the size and weight of the subscriber equipment.[12]

text: Despite the capacity improvement offered by IMTS, demand outstripped capacity. In agreement with state regulatory agencies, AT&T limited the service to just 40,000 customers system wide. In New York City, for example, 2,000 customers shared just 12 radio channels and typically had to wait 30 minutes to place a call.[12]

text: Radio Common Carrier[edit]

text: Radio Common Carrier [15] or RCC was a service introduced in the 1960s by independent telephone companies to compete against AT&T's IMTS. RCC systems used paired UHF 454/459 MHz and VHF 152/158 MHz frequencies near those used by IMTS. RCC based services were provided until the 1980s when cellular AMPS systems made RCC equipment obsolete.

text: Some RCC systems were designed to allow customers of adjacent carriers to use their facilities, but equipment used by RCCs did not allow the equivalent of modern "roaming" because technical standards were not uniform. For example, the phone of an Omaha, Nebraska–based RCC service would not be likely to work in Phoenix, Arizona. Roaming was not encouraged, in part, because there was no centralized industry billing database for RCCs. Signaling formats were not standardized. For example, some systems used two-tone sequential paging to alert a mobile of an incoming call. Other systems used DTMF. Some used Secode 2805, which transmitted an interrupted 2805 Hz tone (similar to IMTS signaling) to alert mobiles of an offered call. Some radio equipment used with RCC systems was half-duplex, push-to-talk LOMO equipment such as Motorola hand-helds or RCA 700-series conventional two-way radios. Other vehicular equipment had telephone handsets and rotary dials or pushbutton pads, and operated full duplex like a conventional wired telephone. A few users had full-duplex briefcase telephones (radically advanced for their day)

text: At the end of RCC's existence, industry associations were working on a technical standard that would have allowed roaming, and some mobile users had multiple decoders to enable operation with more than one of the common signaling formats (600/1500, 2805, and Reach). Manual operation was often a fallback for RCC roamers.

text: Other services[edit]

text: In 1969 Penn Central Railroad equipped commuter trains along the 360 km New York-Washington route with special pay phones that allowed passengers to place telephone calls while the train was moving. The system re-used six frequencies in the 450 MHz band in nine sites.[13]

text: In the UK, Channel Islands and elsewhere the "Rabbit" phone system was briefly used, being a hybrid of "cell" base stations and handsets. One major limitation was that you had to be less than 300 feet (closer with buildings) from a base due to power limitations on a portable device. [16] With modern technology a similar variant is being considered for Apple's new 4G "smart watch" so they can be used in large events in a broadly similar way to a femtocell.

text: European mobile radio networks[edit]

text: This section needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. (April 2012) (Learn how and when to remove this template message)

text: In Europe, several mutually incompatible mobile radio services were developed.

text: In 1966 Norway had a system called OLT which was manually controlled. Finland's ARP, launched in 1971, was also manual as was the Swedish MTD. All were replaced by the automatic NMT, (Nordic Mobile Telephone) system in the early 1980s.

text: In July 1971 Readycall was introduced in London by Burndept after obtaining a special concession to break the Post Office monopoly to allow selective calling to mobiles of calls from the public telephone system. This system was available to the public for a subscription of £16 month. A year later the service was extended to two other UK towns.[17]

text: West Germany had a network called A-Netz launched in 1952 as the country's first public commercial mobile phone network. In 1972 this was displaced by B-Netz which connected calls automatically.

text: The cellular concept[edit]

text: In December 1947, Douglas H. Ring and W. Rae Young, Bell Labs engineers, proposed hexagonal cells for mobile phones in vehicles.[18] At this stage, the technology to implement these ideas did not exist, nor had the frequencies been allocated. Two decades would pass before Richard H. Frenkiel, Joel S. Engel and Philip T. Porter of Bell Labs expanded the early proposals into a much more detailed system plan. It was Porter who first proposed that the cell towers use the now-familiar directional antennas to reduce interference and increase channel reuse (see picture at right) [19] Porter also invented the dial-then-send method used by all cell phones to reduce wasted channel time.

text: In all these early examples, a mobile phone had to stay within the coverage area serviced by one base station throughout the phone call, i.e. there was no continuity of service as the phones moved through several cell areas. The concepts of frequency reuse and handoff, as well as a number of other concepts that formed the basis of modern cell phone technology, were described in the late 1960s, in papers by Frenkiel and Porter. In 1970 Amos E. Joel, Jr., a Bell Labs engineer,[20] invented a "three-sided trunk circuit" to aid in the "call handoff" process from one cell to another. His patent contained an early description of the Bell Labs cellular concept, but as switching systems became faster, such a circuit became unnecessary and was never implemented in a system.

text: A cellular telephone switching plan was described by Fluhr and Nussbaum in 1973,[21] and a cellular telephone data signaling system was described in hipatitas by Hachenburg et al.[22]

text: Emergence of automated services[edit]

text: The first fully automated mobile phone system for vehicles was launched in Sweden in 1956. Named MTA (Mobiltelefonisystem A), it allowed calls to be made and received in the car using a rotary dial. The car phone could also be paged. Calls from the car were direct dial, whereas incoming calls required an operator to locate the nearest base station to the car. It was developed by Sture Laurén and other engineers at Televerket network operator. Ericsson provided the switchboard while Svenska Radioaktiebolaget (SRA) and Marconi provided the telephones and base station equipment. MTA phones consisted of vacuum tubes and relays, and weighed 40 kg. In 1962, an upgraded version called Mobile System B (MTB) was introduced. This was a push-button telephone, and used transistors and DTMF signaling to improve its operational reliability. In 1971 the MTD version was launched, opening for several different brands of equipment and gaining commercial success.[23][24] The network remained open until 1983 and still had 600 customers when it closed.

text: In 1958 development began on a similar system for motorists in the USSR.[25] The "Altay" national civil mobile phone service was based on Soviet MRT-1327 standard. The main developers of the Altay system were the Voronezh Science Research Institute of Communications (VNIIS) and the State Specialized Project Institute (GSPI). In 1963 the service started in Moscow, and by 1970 was deployed in 30 cities across the USSR. Versions of the Altay system are still in use today as a trunking system in some parts of Russia.

text: In 1959 a private telephone company in Brewster, Kansas, USA, the S&T Telephone Company, (still in business today) with the use of Motorola Radio Telephone equipment and a private tower facility, offered to the public mobile telephone services in that local area of NW Kansas. This system was a direct dial up service through their local switchboard, and was installed in many private vehicles including grain combines, trucks, and automobiles. For some as yet unknown reason, the system, after being placed online and operated for a very brief time period, was shut down. The management of the company was immediately changed, and the fully operable system and related equipment was immediately dismantled in early 1960, not to be seen again.[citation needed]

text: In 1966, Bulgaria presented the pocket mobile automatic phone RAT-0,5 combined with a base station RATZ-10 (RATC-10) on Interorgtechnika-66 international exhibition. One base station, connected to one telephone wire line, could serve up to six customers ("Radio" magazine, 2, 1967; "Novosti dnya" newsreel, 37, 1966).

text: One of the first successful public commercial mobile phone networks was the ARP network in Finland, launched in 1971. Posthumously, ARP is sometimes viewed as a zero generation (0G) cellular network, being slightly above previous proprietary and limited coverage networks.[citation needed]

text: Handheld mobile phone[edit]

text: Prior to 1973, mobile telephony was limited to phones installed in cars and other vehicles.[20] Motorola was the first company to produce a handheld mobile phone. On April 3, 1973, Martin Cooper, a Motorola researcher and executive, made the first mobile telephone call from handheld subscriber equipment, placing a call to Dr. Joel S. Engel of Bell Labs, his rival.[26][27] The prototype handheld phone used by Dr. Cooper weighed 1.1 kg (2.42 lb) and measured 23 cm long, 13 cm deep and 4.45 cm wide. The prototype offered a talk time of just 30 minutes and took 10 hours to re-charge.[28]

text: John F. Mitchell,[29][30][31] Motorola's chief of portable communication products and Cooper's boss in 1973, played a key role in advancing the development of handheld mobile telephone equipment. Mitchell successfully pushed Motorola to develop wireless communication products that would be small enough to use anywhere and participated in the design of the cellular phone.[32][33]

text: The early generations[edit]

text: Newer technology has been developed and rolled out in a series of waves or generations. The "generation" terminology only became widely used when 3G was launched, but is now used retroactively when referring to the earlier systems.

text: 1G – Analogue cellular[edit]

text: First automatic analogue cellular systems deployed were NTT's system first used in Tokyo in 1979, later spreading to the whole of Japan, and NMT in the Nordic countries in 1981.

text: The first analogue cellular system widely deployed in North America was the Advanced Mobile Phone System (AMPS).[34] It was commercially introduced in the Americas in 13 October 1983, Israel in 1986, and Australia in 1987. AMPS was a pioneering technology that helped drive mass market usage of cellular technology, but it had several serious issues by modern standards. It was unencrypted and easily vulnerable to eavesdropping via a scanner; it was susceptible to cell phone "cloning" and it used a Frequency-division multiple access (FDMA) scheme and required significant amounts of wireless spectrum to support.

text: On 6 March 1983, the DynaTAC 8000X mobile phone launched on the first US 1G network by Ameritech. It cost $100m to develop, and took over a decade to reach the market.[35] The phone had a talk time of just thirty-five minutes and took ten hours to charge. Consumer demand was strong despite the battery life, weight, and low talk time, and waiting lists were in the thousands.[36][37]

text: Many of the iconic early commercial cell phones such as the Motorola DynaTAC Analog AMPS were eventually superseded by Digital AMPS (D-AMPS) in 1990, and AMPS service was shut down by most North American carriers by 2008.

text: In February 1986 Australia launched its Cellular Telephone System by Telecom Australia. Peter Reedman was the first Telecom Customer to be connected on 6 January 1986 along with five other subscribers as test customers prior to the official launch date of 28 February.

text: 2G – Digital cellular[edit]

text: In the 1990s, the 'second generation' mobile phone systems emerged. Two systems competed for supremacy in the global market: the European developed GSM standard and the U.S. developed CDMA standard. These differed from the previous generation by using digital instead of analog transmission, and also fast out-of-band phone-to-network signaling. The rise in mobile phone usage as a result of 2G was explosive and this era also saw the advent of prepaid mobile phones.

text: In 1991 the first GSM network (Radiolinja) launched in Finland. In general the frequencies used by 2G systems in Europe were higher than those in America, though with some overlap. For example, the 900 MHz frequency range was used for both 1G and 2G systems in Europe, so the 1G systems were rapidly closed down to make space for the 2G systems. In America the IS-54 standard was deployed in the same band as AMPS and displaced some of the existing analog channels.

text: In 1993, IBM Simon was introduced. This was possibly the world's first smartphone. It was a mobile phone, pager, fax machine, and PDA all rolled into one. It included a calendar, address book, clock, calculator, notepad, email, and a touchscreen with a QWERTY keyboard.[38] The IBM Simon had a stylus you used to tap the touch screen with. It featured predictive typing that would guess the next characters as you tapped. It had applications, or at least a way to deliver more features by plugging a PCMCIA 1.8 MB memory card into the phone.[39] Coinciding with the introduction of 2G systems was a trend away from the larger "brick" phones toward tiny 100 – 200 gram hand-held devices. This change was possible not only through technological improvements such as more advanced batteries and more energy-efficient electronics, but also because of the higher density of cell sites to accommodate increasing usage. The latter meant that the average distance transmission from phone to the base station shortened, leading to increased battery life while on the move.

text: The second generation introduced a new variant of communication called SMS or text messaging. It was initially available only on GSM networks but spread eventually on all digital networks. The first machine-generated SMS message was sent in the UK on 3 December 1992 followed in 1993 by the first person-to-person SMS sent in Finland. The advent of prepaid services in the late 1990s soon made SMS the communication method of choice among the young, a trend which spread across all ages.

text: 2G also introduced the ability to access media content on mobile phones. In 1998 the first downloadable content sold to mobile phones was the ring tone, launched by Finland's Radiolinja (now Elisa). Advertising on the mobile phone first appeared in Finland when a free daily SMS news headline service was launched in 2000, sponsored by advertising.

text: Mobile payments were trialed in 1998 in Finland and Sweden where a mobile phone was used to pay for a Coca-Cola vending machine and car parking. Commercial launches followed in 1999 in Norway. The first commercial payment system to mimic banks and credit cards was launched in the Philippines in 1999 simultaneously by mobile operators Globe and Smart.

text: The first full internet service on mobile phones was introduced by NTT DoCoMo in Japan in 1999.

text: 3G – Mobile broadband[edit]

text: As the use of 2G phones became more widespread and people began to use mobile phones in their daily lives, it became clear that demand for data (such as access to browse the internet) was growing. Further, experience from fixed broadband services showed there would also be an ever-increasing demand for greater data speeds. The 2G technology was nowhere near up to the job, so the industry began to work on the next generation of technology known as 3G. The main technological difference that distinguishes 3G technology from 2G technology is the use of packet switching rather than circuit switching for data transmission.[40] In addition, the standardization process focused on requirements more than technology (2 Mbit/s maximum data rate indoors, 384 kbit/s outdoors, for example).

text: Inevitably this led to many competing standards with different contenders pushing their own technologies, and the vision of a single unified worldwide standard looked far from reality. The standard 2G CDMA networks became 3G compliant with the adoption of Revision A to EV-DO, which made several additions to the protocol while retaining backwards compatibility:

text:
Introduction of several new forward link data rates that increase the maximum burst rate from 2.45 Mbit/s to 3.1 Mbit/s
Protocols that would decrease connection establishment time
Ability for more than one mobile to share the same time slot
Introduction of QoS flags

text: All these were put in place to allow for low latency, low bit rate communications such as VoIP.[41]

text: The first pre-commercial trial network with 3G was launched by NTT DoCoMo in Japan in the Tokyo region in May 2001. NTT DoCoMo launched the first commercial 3G network on 1 October 2001, using the WCDMA technology. In 2002 the first 3G networks on the rival CDMA2000 1xEV-DO technology were launched by SK Telecom and KTF in South Korea, and Monet in the US. Monet has since gone bankrupt. By the end of 2002, the second WCDMA network was launched in Japan by Vodafone KK (now Softbank). European launches of 3G were in Italy and the UK by Three/Hutchison group, on WCDMA. 2003 saw a further eight commercial launches of 3G, six more on WCDMA and two more on the EV-DO standard.

text: During the development of 3G systems, 2.5G systems such as CDMA2000 1x and GPRS were developed as extensions to existing 2G networks. These provide some of the features of 3G without fulfilling the promised high data rates or full range of multimedia services. CDMA2000-1X delivers theoretical maximum data speeds of up to 307 kbit/s. Just beyond these is the EDGE system which in theory covers the requirements for 3G system, but is so narrowly above these that any practical system would be sure to fall short.

text: The high connection speeds of 3G technology enabled a transformation in the industry: for the first time, media streaming of radio (and even television) content to 3G handsets became possible,[42] with companies such as RealNetworks[43] and Disney[44] among the early pioneers in this type of offering.

text: In the mid-2000s (decade), an evolution of 3G technology began to be implemented, namely High-Speed Downlink Packet Access (HSDPA). It is an enhanced 3G (third generation) mobile telephony communications protocol in the High-Speed Packet Access (HSPA) family, also coined 3.5G, 3G+ or turbo 3G, which allows networks based on Universal Mobile Telecommunications System (UMTS) to have higher data transfer speeds and capacity. Current HSDPA deployments support down-link speeds of 1.8, 3.6, 7.2 and 14.0 Mbit/s.

text: By the end of 2007, there were 295 million subscribers on 3G networks worldwide, which reflected 9% of the total worldwide subscriber base. About two thirds of these were on the WCDMA standard and one third on the EV-DO standard. The 3G telecoms services generated over $120 billion of revenues during 2007 and at many markets the majority of new phones activated were 3G phones. In Japan and South Korea the market no longer supplies phones of the second generation.

text: Although mobile phones had long had the ability to access data networks such as the Internet, it was not until the widespread availability of good quality 3G coverage in the mid-2000s (decade) that specialized devices appeared to access the mobile web. The first such devices, known as "dongles", plugged directly into a computer through the USB port. Another new class of device appeared subsequently, the so-called "compact wireless router" such as the Novatel MiFi, which makes 3G Internet connectivity available to multiple computers simultaneously over Wi-Fi, rather than just to a single computer via a USB plug-in.

text: Such devices became especially popular for use with laptop computers due to the added portability they bestow. Consequently, some computer manufacturers started to embed the mobile data function directly into the laptop so a dongle or MiFi wasn't needed. Instead, the SIM card could be inserted directly into the device itself to access the mobile data services. Such 3G-capable laptops became commonly known as "netbooks". Other types of data-aware devices followed in the netbook's footsteps. By the beginning of 2010, E-readers, such as the Amazon Kindle and the Nook from Barnes & Noble, had already become available with embedded wireless Internet, and Apple had announced plans for embedded wireless Internet on its iPad tablet devices later that year.

text: 4G – Native IP networks[edit]

text: By 2009, it had become clear that, at some point, 3G networks would be overwhelmed by the growth of bandwidth-intensive applications like streaming media.[45] Consequently, the industry began looking to data-optimized 4th-generation technologies, with the promise of speed improvements up to 10-fold over existing 3G technologies. The first two commercially available technologies billed as 4G were the WiMAX standard (offered in the U.S. by Sprint) and the LTE standard, first offered in Scandinavia by TeliaSonera.

text: One of the main ways in which 4G differed technologically from 3G was in its elimination of circuit switching, instead employing an all-IP network. Thus, 4G ushered in a treatment of voice calls just like any other type of streaming audio media, utilizing packet switching over Internet, LAN or WAN networks via VoIP.[46]

text: Satellite mobile[edit]

text: As well as the now-common cellular phone, there is also the very different approach of connecting directly from the handset to an Earth-orbiting satellite. Such mobile phones can be used in remote areas out of reach of wired networks or where construction of a cellular network is uneconomic.

text: The Inmarsat system is the oldest, originally developed in 1979 for safety of life at sea, and uses a series of satellites in geostationary orbits to cover the majority of the globe. Several smaller operators use the same approach with just one or two satellites to provide a regional service. An alternative approach is to use a series of low Earth orbit satellites much closer to Earth. This is the basis of the Iridium and Globalstar satellite phone services.


document_title: Jackie Robinson

question_text: when did jackie robinson retire from the brooklyn dodgers

question_tokens: when did jackie robinson retire from the brooklyn dodgers

root

text: Jackie Robinson

text: Early life

text: Family and personal life

text: Robinson was born on January 31, 1919, into a family of sharecroppers in Cairo, Georgia. He was the youngest of five children born to Mallie (McGriff) and Jerry Robinson, after siblings Edgar, Frank, Matthew (nicknamed "Mack"), and Willa Mae.[8][9][10] His middle name was in honor of former President Theodore Roosevelt, who died 25 days before Robinson was born.[11][12] After Robinson's father left the family in 1920, they moved to Pasadena, California.[13][14][15]

tag: p

text: The extended Robinson family established itself on a residential plot containing two small houses at 121 Pepper Street in Pasadena. Robinson's mother worked various odd jobs to support the family.[16] Growing up in relative poverty in an otherwise affluent community, Robinson and his minority friends were excluded from many recreational opportunities.[17] As a result, Robinson joined a neighborhood gang, but his friend Carl Anderson persuaded him to abandon it.[17][18][19]

text: John Muir High School

text: In 1935, Robinson graduated from Washington Junior High School and enrolled at John Muir High School (Muir Tech).[20] Recognizing his athletic talents, Robinson's older brothers Mack (himself an accomplished athlete and silver medalist at the 1936 Summer Olympics)[19] and Frank inspired Jackie to pursue his interest in sports.[21][22]

text: At Muir Tech, Robinson played several sports at the varsity level and lettered in four of them: football, basketball, track, and baseball.[15] He played shortstop and catcher on the baseball team, quarterback on the football team, and guard on the basketball team. With the track and field squad, he won awards in the broad jump. He was also a member of the tennis team.[23]

text: In 1936, Robinson won the junior boys singles championship in the annual Pacific Coast Negro Tennis Tournament and earned a place on the Pomona annual baseball tournament all-star team, which included future Hall of Famers Ted Williams and Bob Lemon.[24] In late January 1937, the Pasadena Star-News newspaper reported that Robinson "for two years has been the outstanding athlete at Muir, starring in football, basketball, track, baseball and tennis."[25]

text: Pasadena Junior College

text: After Muir, Robinson attended Pasadena Junior College (PJC), where he continued his athletic career by participating in basketball, football, baseball, and track.[26] On the football team, he played quarterback and safety. He was a shortstop and leadoff hitter for the baseball team, and he broke school broad-jump records held by his brother Mack.[15] As at Muir High School, most of Jackie's teammates were white.[24] While playing football at PJC, Robinson suffered a fractured ankle, complications from which would eventually delay his deployment status while in the military.[27][28] In 1938, he was elected to the All-Southland Junior College Team for baseball and selected as the region's Most Valuable Player.[22][29]

text: That year, Robinson was one of 10 students named to the school's Order of the Mast and Dagger (Omicron Mu Delta), awarded to students performing "outstanding service to the school and whose scholastic and citizenship record is worthy of recognition."[30] Also while at PJC, he was elected to the Lancers, a student-run police organization responsible for patrolling various school activities.[31]

text: An incident at PJC illustrated Robinson's impatience with authority figures he perceived as racist—a character trait that would resurface repeatedly in his life. On January 25, 1938, he was arrested after vocally disputing the detention of a black friend by police.[32] Robinson received a two-year suspended sentence, but the incident—along with other rumored run-ins between Robinson and police—gave Robinson a reputation for combativeness in the face of racial antagonism.[33] While at PJC, he was motivated by a preacher (the Rev. Karl Downs) to attend church on a regular basis, and Downs became a confidant for Robinson, a Christian.[34] Toward the end of his PJC tenure, Frank Robinson (to whom Robinson felt closest among his three brothers) was killed in a motorcycle accident. The event motivated Jackie to pursue his athletic career at the nearby University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), where he could remain closer to Frank's family.[22][35]

text: UCLA and afterward

text: After graduating from PJC in spring 1939,[36] Robinson enrolled at UCLA, where he became the school's first athlete to win varsity letters in four sports: baseball, basketball, football, and track.[37][38]

text: He was one of four black players on the 1939 UCLA Bruins football team; the others were Woody Strode, Kenny Washington, and Ray Bartlett. Washington, Strode, and Robinson made up three of the team's four backfield players.[39] At a time when only a few black students played mainstream college football, this made UCLA college football's most integrated team.[40][41]

text: In track and field, Robinson won the 1940 NCAA Men's Track and Field Championships in the long jump, jumping 24 ft 10 1⁄4 in (7.58 m).[42] Belying his future career, baseball was Robinson's "worst sport" at UCLA; he hit .097 in his only season, although in his first game he went 4-for-4 and twice stole home.[43]

text: While a senior at UCLA, Robinson met his future wife, Rachel Isum (b. 1922), a UCLA freshman who was familiar with Robinson's athletic career at PJC.[44] In the spring semester of 1941, Robinson left college just shy of graduation despite his mother's and Isum's reservations.[45] He took a job as an assistant athletic director with the government's National Youth Administration (NYA) in Atascadero, California.[46][47][48]

text: After the government ceased NYA operations, Robinson traveled to Honolulu in the fall of 1941 to play football for the semi-professional, racially integrated Honolulu Bears.[46][48] After a short season, Robinson returned to California in December 1941 to pursue a career as running back for the Los Angeles Bulldogs of the Pacific Coast Football League.[49] By that time, however, the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor had taken place, drawing the United States into World War II and ending Robinson's nascent football career.[46]

text: Military career

text: In 1942, Robinson was drafted and assigned to a segregated Army cavalry unit in Fort Riley, Kansas. Having the requisite qualifications, Robinson and several other black soldiers applied for admission to an Officer Candidate School (OCS) then located at Fort Riley. Although the Army's initial July 1941 guidelines for OCS had been drafted as race neutral, few black applicants were admitted into OCS until after subsequent directives by Army leadership.[50] As a result, the applications of Robinson and his colleagues were delayed for several months.[51] After protests by heavyweight boxing champion Joe Louis (then stationed at Fort Riley) and the help of Truman Gibson (then an assistant civilian aide to the Secretary of War),[52] the men were accepted into OCS.[46][51][53] The experience led to a personal friendship between Robinson and Louis.[54][55] Upon finishing OCS, Robinson was commissioned as a second lieutenant in January 1943.[38] Shortly afterward, Robinson and Isum were formally engaged.[51]

text: After receiving his commission, Robinson was reassigned to Fort Hood, Texas, where he joined the 761st "Black Panthers" Tank Battalion. While at Fort Hood, Robinson often used his weekend leave to visit the Rev. Karl Downs, President of Sam Huston College (now Huston-Tillotson University) in nearby Austin, Texas; Downs had been Robinson's pastor at Scott United Methodist Church while Robinson attended PJC.[32][56]

text: An event on July 6, 1944 derailed Robinson's military career.[57] While awaiting results of hospital tests on the ankle he had injured in junior college, Robinson boarded an Army bus with a fellow officer's wife; although the Army had commissioned its own unsegregated bus line, the bus driver ordered Robinson to move to the back of the bus.[58][59][60] Robinson refused. The driver backed down, but after reaching the end of the line, summoned the military police, who took Robinson into custody.[58][61] When Robinson later confronted the investigating duty officer about racist questioning by the officer and his assistant, the officer recommended Robinson be court-martialed.[58][62] After Robinson's commander in the 761st, Paul L. Bates, refused to authorize the legal action,[63] Robinson was summarily transferred to the 758th Battalion—where the commander quickly consented to charge Robinson with multiple offenses, including, among other charges, public drunkenness, even though Robinson did not drink.[58][64]

text: By the time of the court-martial in August 1944, the charges against Robinson had been reduced to two counts of insubordination during questioning.[58] Robinson was acquitted by an all-white panel of nine officers.[58] The experiences Robinson was subjected to during the court proceedings would be remembered when he later joined MLB and was subjected to racist attacks.[65] Although his former unit, the 761st Tank Battalion, became the first black tank unit to see combat in World War II, Robinson's court-martial proceedings prohibited him from being deployed overseas; thus, he never saw combat action.[66]

text: After his acquittal, he was transferred to Camp Breckinridge, Kentucky, where he served as a coach for army athletics until receiving an honorable discharge in November 1944.[67] While there, Robinson met a former player for the Kansas City Monarchs of the Negro American League, who encouraged Robinson to write the Monarchs and ask for a tryout.[68] Robinson took the former player's advice and wrote to Monarchs' co-owner Thomas Baird.[69]

text: Post-military

text: After his discharge, Robinson briefly returned to his old football club, the Los Angeles Bulldogs.[49] Robinson then accepted an offer from his old friend and pastor Rev. Karl Downs to be the athletic director at Sam Huston College in Austin, then of the Southwestern Athletic Conference.[70] The job included coaching the school's basketball team for the 1944–45 season.[56] As it was a fledgling program, few students tried out for the basketball team, and Robinson even resorted to inserting himself into the lineup for exhibition games.[70][71] Although his teams were outmatched by opponents, Robinson was respected as a disciplinarian coach,[56] and drew the admiration of, among others, Langston University basketball player Marques Haynes, a future member of the Harlem Globetrotters.[72]

text: Playing career

text: Negro leagues

text: In early 1945, while Robinson was at Sam Huston College, the Kansas City Monarchs sent him a written offer to play professional baseball in the Negro leagues.[56][73] Robinson accepted a contract for $400 per month.[46][74] Although he played well for the Monarchs, Robinson was frustrated with the experience. He had grown used to a structured playing environment in college, and the Negro leagues' disorganization and embrace of gambling interests appalled him.[75][76] The hectic travel schedule also placed a burden on his relationship with Isum, with whom he could now communicate only by letter.[77] In all, Robinson played 47 games at shortstop for the Monarchs, hitting .387 with five home runs, and registering 13 stolen bases.[78] He also appeared in the 1945 Negro League All-Star Game, going hitless in five at-bats.[79]

text: During the season, Robinson pursued potential major-league interests. The Boston Red Sox held a tryout at Fenway Park for Robinson and other black players on April 16.[80] The tryout, however, was a farce chiefly designed to assuage the desegregationist sensibilities of powerful Boston City Councilman Isadore Muchnick.[81] Even with the stands limited to management, Robinson was subjected to racial epithets.[82] Robinson left the tryout humiliated,[80] and more than fourteen years later, in July 1959, the Red Sox became the last major league team to integrate its roster.[83]

text: Other teams, however, had more serious interest in signing a black ballplayer. In the mid-1940s, Branch Rickey, club president and general manager of the Brooklyn Dodgers, began to scout the Negro leagues for a possible addition to the Dodgers' roster. Rickey selected Robinson from a list of promising black players and interviewed him for possible assignment to Brooklyn's International League farm club, the Montreal Royals.[84] Rickey was especially interested in making sure his eventual signee could withstand the inevitable racial abuse that would be directed at him.[7][85] In a famous three-hour exchange on August 28, 1945,[86] Rickey asked Robinson if he could face the racial animus without taking the bait and reacting angrily—a concern given Robinson's prior arguments with law enforcement officials at PJC and in the military.[46] Robinson was aghast: "Are you looking for a Negro who is afraid to fight back?"[85][87] Rickey replied that he needed a Negro player "with guts enough not to fight back."[85][87] After obtaining a commitment from Robinson to "turn the other cheek" to racial antagonism, Rickey agreed to sign him to a contract for $600 a month, equal to $7,982 today.[88][89] Rickey did not offer compensation to the Monarchs, instead believing all Negro league players were free agents due to the contracts' not containing a reserve clause.[90] Among those Rickey discussed prospects with was Wendell Smith, writer for the black weekly Pittsburgh Courier, who according to Cleveland Indians owner and team president Bill Veeck "influenced Rickey to take Jack Robinson, for which he's never completely gotten credit."[91]

text: Although he required Robinson to keep the arrangement a secret for the time being, Rickey committed to formally signing Robinson before November 1, 1945.[92] On October 23, it was publicly announced that Robinson would be assigned to the Royals for the 1946 season.[46][89][93] On the same day, with representatives of the Royals and Dodgers present, Robinson formally signed his contract with the Royals.[94] In what was later referred to as "The Noble Experiment",[46][95] Robinson was the first black baseball player in the International League since the 1880s.[96] He was not necessarily the best player in the Negro leagues,[97] and black talents Satchel Paige and Josh Gibson were upset when Robinson was selected first.[98] Larry Doby, who broke the color line in the American League the same year as Robinson, said, "One of the things that was disappointing and disheartening to a lot of the black players at the time was that Jack was not the best player. The best was Josh Gibson. I think that's one of the reasons why Josh died so early – he was heartbroken."[99]

text: Rickey's offer allowed Robinson to leave behind the Monarchs and their grueling bus rides, and he went home to Pasadena. That September, he signed with Chet Brewer's Kansas City Royals, a post-season barnstorming team in the California Winter League.[100] Later that off-season, he briefly toured South America with another barnstorming team, while his fiancée Isum pursued nursing opportunities in New York City.[101] On February 10, 1946, Robinson and Isum were married by their old friend, the Rev. Karl Downs.[46][102][103]

text: Minor leagues

text: In 1946, Robinson arrived at Daytona Beach, Florida, for spring training with the Montreal Royals of the Class AAA International League (the designation of "AAA" for the highest level of minor league baseball was first used in the 1946 season). Clay Hopper, the manager of the Royals, asked Rickey to assign Robinson to any other Dodger affiliate, but Rickey refused.[104]

text: Robinson's presence was controversial in racially charged Florida. As he was not allowed to stay with his teammates at the team hotel, he lodged instead at the home of a local black politician.[105][106] Since the Dodgers organization did not own a spring training facility (the Dodger-controlled spring training compound in Vero Beach known as "Dodgertown" did not open until spring 1948),[107] scheduling was subject to the whim of area localities, several of which turned down any event involving Robinson or Johnny Wright, another black player whom Rickey had signed to the Dodgers' organization in January. In Sanford, Florida, the police chief threatened to cancel games if Robinson and Wright did not cease training activities there; as a result, Robinson was sent back to Daytona Beach.[108][109] In Jacksonville, the stadium was padlocked shut without warning on game day, by order of the city's Parks and Public Property director.[110][111] In DeLand, a scheduled day game was postponed, ostensibly because of issues with the stadium's electrical lighting.[112][113]

text: After much lobbying of local officials by Rickey himself, the Royals were allowed to host a game involving Robinson in Daytona Beach.[114][115] Robinson made his Royals debut at Daytona Beach's City Island Ballpark on March 17, 1946, in an exhibition game against the team's parent club, the Dodgers. Robinson thus became the first black player to openly play for a minor league team against a major league team since the de facto baseball color line had been implemented in the 1880s.[2]

text: Later in spring training, after some less-than-stellar performances, Robinson was shifted from shortstop to second base, allowing him to make shorter throws to first base.[64] Robinson's performance soon rebounded. On April 18, 1946, Roosevelt Stadium hosted the Jersey City Giants' season opener against the Montreal Royals, marking the professional debut of the Royals' Jackie Robinson and the first time the color barrier had been broken in a game between two minor league clubs.[116] Pitching against Robinson was Warren Sandel who had played against him when they both lived in California. During Robinson's first at bat, the Jersey City catcher, Dick Bouknight, demanded that Sandel throw at Robinson, but Sandel refused. Although Sandel induced Robinson to ground out at his first at bat, in his five trips to the plate, Robinson ended up with four hits, including his first hit, a three-run home run, in the game's third inning.[117] He also scored four runs, drove in three, and stole two bases in the Royals' 14–1 victory.[118] Robinson proceeded to lead the International League that season with a .349 batting average and .985 fielding percentage,[21] and he was named the league's Most Valuable Player.[119] Although he often faced hostility while on road trips (the Royals were forced to cancel a Southern exhibition tour, for example),[64] the Montreal fan base enthusiastically supported Robinson.[120][121] Whether fans supported or opposed it, Robinson's presence on the field was a boon to attendance; more than one million people went to games involving Robinson in 1946, an amazing figure by International League standards.[122] In the fall of 1946, following the baseball season, Robinson returned home to California and briefly played professional basketball for the short-lived Los Angeles Red Devils.[123][124]

text: Major leagues

text: Breaking the color barrier (1947)

text: The following year, six days before the start of the 1947 season, the Dodgers called Robinson up to the major leagues. With Eddie Stanky entrenched at second base for the Dodgers, Robinson played his initial major league season as a first baseman.[85] On April 15, 1947, Robinson made his major league debut at the relatively advanced age of 28 at Ebbets Field before a crowd of 26,623 spectators, more than 14,000 of whom were black.[125] Although he failed to get a base hit, he walked and scored a run in the Dodgers' 5–3 victory.[125] Robinson became the first player since 1880 to openly break the major league baseball color line.[126] Black fans began flocking to see the Dodgers when they came to town, abandoning their Negro league teams.[98]

text: Robinson's promotion met a generally positive, although mixed, reception among newspapers and white major league players.[122][127] However, racial tension existed in the Dodger clubhouse.[128] Some Dodger players insinuated they would sit out rather than play alongside Robinson. The brewing mutiny ended when Dodgers management took a stand for Robinson. Manager Leo Durocher informed the team, "I do not care if the guy is yellow or black, or if he has stripes like a fuckin' zebra. I'm the manager of this team, and I say he plays. What's more, I say he can make us all rich. And if any of you cannot use the money, I will see that you are all traded."[129]

text: Robinson was also derided by opposing teams. Some, notably the St. Louis Cardinals, threatened to strike if Robinson played, but also to spread the walkout across the entire National League. Existence of the plot was leaked by the Cardinals' team physician, Robert Hyland, to a friend, the New York Herald Tribune's Rutherford "Rud" Rennie. The reporter, concerned about protecting Hyland's anonymity and job, in turn leaked it to his Tribune colleague and editor, Stanley Woodward, whose own subsequent reporting with other sources protected Hyland.[130][131][132] The Woodward article made national headlines. After the threat was exposed, National League President Ford Frick and Baseball Commissioner Happy Chandler let it be known that any striking players would be suspended. "You will find that the friends that you think you have in the press box will not support you, that you will be outcasts," threatened Chandler. "I do not care if half the league strikes. Those who do it will encounter quick retribution. All will be suspended and I don't care if it wrecks the National League for five years. This is the United States of America and one citizen has as much right to play as another."[132][133][134][135] Woodward's article received the E. P. Dutton Award in 1947 for Best Sports Reporting.[132] New York Times columnist Red Smith turned to the Cardinals' 1947 racial strike in 1977, as a spate of commemorative articles appeared on the 30th anniversary of Robinson's signing with the Dodgers. Smith remembered his old Herald Tribune colleagues' part in exposing the players' strike conspiracy. It would have succeeded, wrote Smith, "…if Rud Rennie and Stanley Woodward hadn't exposed their intentions in the New York Herald Tribune."[136]

text: Robinson nonetheless became the target of rough physical play by opponents (particularly the Cardinals). At one time, he received a seven-inch gash in his leg from Enos Slaughter.[137] On April 22, 1947, during a game between the Dodgers and the Philadelphia Phillies, Phillies players and manager Ben Chapman called Robinson a "nigger" from their dugout and yelled that he should "go back to the cotton fields".[138][139] Rickey later recalled that Chapman "did more than anybody to unite the Dodgers. When he poured out that string of unconscionable abuse, he solidified and united thirty men."[140]

text: Robinson did, however, receive significant encouragement from several major league players. Robinson named Lee "Jeep" Handley, who played for the Phillies at the time, as the first opposing player to wish him well.[141] Dodgers teammate Pee Wee Reese once came to Robinson's defense with the famous line, "You can hate a man for many reasons. Color is not one of them."[142] In 1948, Reese put his arm around Robinson in response to fans who shouted racial slurs at Robinson before a game in Cincinnati.[143] A statue by sculptor William Behrends, unveiled at KeySpan Park on November 1, 2005, commemorates this event by representing Reese with his arm around Robinson.[144] Jewish baseball star Hank Greenberg, who had to deal with racial epithets during his career, also encouraged Robinson. Following an incident where Greenberg collided with Robinson at first base, he "whispered a few words into Robinson's ear", which Robinson later characterized as "words of encouragement."[145] Greenberg had advised him to overcome his critics by defeating them in games.[145] Robinson also talked frequently with Larry Doby, who endured his own hardships since becoming the first black player in the American League with the Cleveland Indians, as the two spoke to one another via telephone throughout the season.[146]

text: Robinson finished the season having played in 151 games for the Dodgers, with a batting average of .297, an on-base percentage of .383, and a .427 slugging percentage. He had 175 hits (scoring 125 runs) including 31 doubles, 5 triples, and 12 home runs, driving in 48 runs for the year. Robinson led the league in sacrifice hits, with 28, and in stolen bases, with 29.[147] His cumulative performance earned him the inaugural Major League Baseball Rookie of the Year Award (separate National and American League Rookie of the Year honors were not awarded until 1949).[148]

text: MVP, Congressional testimony, and film biography (1948–1950)

text: Following Stanky's trade to the Boston Braves in March 1948, Robinson took over second base, where he logged a .980 fielding percentage that year (second in the National League at the position, fractionally behind Stanky).[149] Robinson had a batting average of .296 and 22 stolen bases for the season.[150] In a 12–7 win against the St. Louis Cardinals on August 29, 1948, he hit for the cycle—a home run, a triple, a double, and a single in the same game.[151] The Dodgers briefly moved into first place in the National League in late August 1948, but they ultimately finished third as the Braves went on to win the league title and lose to the Cleveland Indians in the World Series.[152]

text: Racial pressure on Robinson eased in 1948 as a number of other black players entered the major leagues. Larry Doby (who broke the color barrier in the American League on July 5, 1947, just 11 weeks after Robinson) and Satchel Paige played for the Cleveland Indians, and the Dodgers had three other black players besides Robinson.[149] In February 1948, he signed a $12,500 contract (equal to $124,602 today) with the Dodgers; while a significant amount, this was less than Robinson made in the off-season from a vaudeville tour, where he answered pre-set baseball questions, and a speaking tour of the South. Between the tours, he underwent surgery on his right ankle. Because of his off-season activities, Robinson reported to training camp 30 pounds (14 kg) overweight. He lost the weight during training camp, but dieting left him weak at the plate.[153] In 1948, Wendell Smith's book, Jackie Robinson: My Own Story, was released.[154]

text: In the spring of 1949, Robinson turned to Hall of Famer George Sisler, working as an advisor to the Dodgers, for batting help. At Sisler's suggestion, Robinson spent hours at a batting tee, learning to hit the ball to right field.[155] Sisler taught Robinson to anticipate a fastball, on the theory that it is easier to subsequently adjust to a slower curveball.[155] Robinson also noted that "Sisler showed me how to stop lunging, how to check my swing until the last fraction of a second".[155] The tutelage helped Robinson raise his batting average from .296 in 1948 to .342 in 1949.[155] In addition to his improved batting average, Robinson stole 37 bases that season, was second place in the league for both doubles and triples, and registered 124 runs batted in with 122 runs scored.[85] For the performance Robinson earned the Most Valuable Player Award for the National League.[85] Baseball fans also voted Robinson as the starting second baseman for the 1949 All-Star Game—the first All-Star Game to include black players.[156][157]

text: That year, a song about Robinson by Buddy Johnson, "Did You See Jackie Robinson Hit That Ball?", reached number 13 on the charts; Count Basie recorded a famous version.[158] Ultimately, the Dodgers won the National League pennant, but lost in five games to the New York Yankees in the 1949 World Series.[149]

text: Summer 1949 brought an unwanted distraction for Robinson. In July, he was called to testify before the United States House of Representatives' Committee on Un-American Activities (HUAC) concerning statements made that April by black athlete and actor Paul Robeson. Robinson was reluctant to testify, but he eventually agreed to do so, fearing it might negatively affect his career if he declined.[159]

text: In 1950, Robinson led the National League in double plays made by a second baseman with 133.[151] His salary that year was the highest any Dodger had been paid to that point: $35,000[160] ($348,402 in 2016 dollars[161]). He finished the year with 99 runs scored, a .328 batting average, and 12 stolen bases.[150] The year saw the release of a film biography of Robinson's life, The Jackie Robinson Story, in which Robinson played himself,[162] and actress Ruby Dee played Rachael "Rae" (Isum) Robinson.[163] The project had been previously delayed when the film's producers refused to accede to demands of two Hollywood studios that the movie include scenes of Robinson being tutored in baseball by a white man.[164] The New York Times wrote that Robinson, "doing that rare thing of playing himself in the picture's leading role, displays a calm assurance and composure that might be envied by many a Hollywood star."[165]

text: Robinson's Hollywood exploits, however, did not sit well with Dodgers co-owner Walter O'Malley, who referred to Robinson as "Rickey's prima donna".[166] In late 1950, Rickey's contract as the Dodgers' team President expired. Weary of constant disagreements with O'Malley, and with no hope of being re-appointed as President of the Dodgers, Rickey cashed out his one-quarter financial interest in the team, leaving O'Malley in full control of the franchise.[167] Rickey shortly thereafter became general manager of the Pittsburgh Pirates. Robinson was disappointed at the turn of events and wrote a sympathetic letter to Rickey, whom he considered a father figure, stating, "Regardless of what happens to me in the future, it all can be placed on what you have done and, believe me, I appreciate it."[168][169][170]

text: Pennant races and outside interests (1951–1953)

text: Before the 1951 season, O'Malley reportedly offered Robinson the job of manager of the Montreal Royals, effective at the end of Robinson's playing career. O'Malley was quoted in the Montreal Standard as saying, "Jackie told me that he would be both delighted and honored to tackle this managerial post"—although reports differed as to whether a position was ever formally offered.[171][172]

text: During the 1951 season, Robinson led the National League in double plays made by a second baseman for the second year in a row, with 137.[151] He also kept the Dodgers in contention for the 1951 pennant. During the last game of the regular season, in the 13th inning, he had a hit to tie the game, and then won the game with a home run in the 14th. This forced a best-of-three playoff series against the crosstown rival New York Giants.[173]

text: Despite Robinson's regular-season heroics, the Dodgers lost the pennant on Bobby Thomson's famous home run, known as the Shot Heard 'Round the World, on October 3, 1951. Overcoming his dejection, Robinson dutifully observed Thomson's feet to ensure he touched all the bases. Dodgers sportscaster Vin Scully later noted that the incident showed "how much of a competitor Robinson was."[174] He finished the season with 106 runs scored, a batting average of .335, and 25 stolen bases.[150]

text: Robinson had what was an average year for him in 1952.[175] He finished the year with 104 runs, a .308 batting average, and 24 stolen bases.[150] He did, however, record a career-high on-base percentage of .436.[150] The Dodgers improved on their performance from the year before, winning the National League pennant before losing the 1952 World Series to the New York Yankees in seven games. That year, on the television show Youth Wants to Know, Robinson challenged the Yankees' general manager, George Weiss, on the racial record of his team, which had yet to sign a black player.[176] Sportswriter Dick Young, whom Robinson had described as a "bigot", said, "If there was one flaw in Jackie, it was the common one. He believed that everything unpleasant that happened to him happened because of his blackness."[177] The 1952 season was the last year Robinson was an everyday starter at second base. Afterward, Robinson played variously at first, second, and third bases, shortstop, and in the outfield, with Jim Gilliam, another black player, taking over everyday second base duties.[150] Robinson's interests began to shift toward the prospect of managing a major league team. He had hoped to gain experience by managing in the Puerto Rican Winter League, but according to the New York Post, Commissioner Happy Chandler denied the request.[178]

text: In 1953, Robinson had 109 runs, a .329 batting average, and 17 steals,[150] leading the Dodgers to another National League pennant (and another World Series loss to the Yankees, this time in six games). Robinson's continued success spawned a string of death threats.[179] He was not dissuaded, however, from addressing racial issues publicly. That year, he served as editor for Our Sports magazine, a periodical focusing on Negro sports issues; contributions to the magazine included an article on golf course segregation by Robinson's old friend Joe Louis.[180][181] Robinson also openly criticized segregated hotels and restaurants that served the Dodger organization; a number of these establishments integrated as a result, including the five-star Chase Park Hotel in St. Louis.[137][182]

text: World Championship and retirement (1954–1956)

text: In 1954, Robinson had 62 runs scored, a .311 batting average, and 7 steals. His best day at the plate was on June 17, when he hit two home runs and two doubles.[150][151] The following autumn, Robinson won his only championship when the Dodgers beat the New York Yankees in the 1955 World Series. Although the team enjoyed ultimate success, 1955 was the worst year of Robinson's individual career. He hit .256 and stole only 12 bases. The Dodgers tried Robinson in the outfield and as a third baseman, both because of his diminishing abilities and because Gilliam was established at second base.[183] Robinson, then 37 years old, missed 49 games and did not play in Game 7 of the World Series.[174] Robinson missed the game because manager Walter Alston decided to play Gilliam at second and Don Hoak at third base. That season, the Dodgers' Don Newcombe became the first black major league pitcher to win twenty games in a year.[184]

text: In 1956, Robinson had 61 runs scored, a .275 batting average, and 12 steals.[150] By then, he had begun to exhibit the effects of diabetes, and to lose interest in the prospect of playing or managing professional baseball.[178] After the season, Robinson was traded by the Dodgers to the arch-rival New York Giants for Dick Littlefield and $35,000 cash (equal to $308,317 today). The trade, however, was never completed; unbeknownst to the Dodgers, Robinson had already agreed with the president of Chock full o'Nuts to quit baseball and become an executive with the company.[185] Since Robinson had sold exclusive rights to any retirement story to Look magazine two years previously,[185] his retirement decision was revealed through the magazine, instead of through the Dodgers organization.[186]

text: Legacy

text: Robinson's major league debut brought an end to approximately sixty years of segregation in professional baseball, known as the baseball color line.[126] After World War II, several other forces were also leading the country toward increased equality for blacks, including their accelerated migration to the North, where their political clout grew, and President Harry Truman's desegregation of the military in 1948.[187] Robinson's breaking of the baseball color line and his professional success symbolized these broader changes and demonstrated that the fight for equality was more than simply a political matter. Martin Luther King, Jr. said that he was "a legend and a symbol in his own time", and that he "challenged the dark skies of intolerance and frustration."[188] According to historian Doris Kearns Goodwin, Robinson's "efforts were a monumental step in the civil-rights revolution in America ... [His] accomplishments allowed black and white Americans to be more respectful and open to one another and more appreciative of everyone's abilities."[189]

text: Beginning his major league career at the relatively advanced age of twenty-eight, he played only ten seasons from 1947 to 1956, all of them for the Brooklyn Dodgers.[190] During his career, the Dodgers played in six World Series, and Robinson himself played in six All-Star Games.[5] In 1999, he was posthumously named to the Major League Baseball All-Century Team.[191]

text: Robinson's career is generally considered to mark the beginning of the post–"long ball" era in baseball, in which a reliance on raw power-hitting gave way to balanced offensive strategies that used footspeed to create runs through aggressive baserunning.[192] Robinson exhibited the combination of hitting ability and speed which exemplified the new era. He scored more than 100 runs in six of his ten seasons (averaging more than 110 runs from 1947 to 1953), had a .311 career batting average, a .409 career on-base percentage, a .474 slugging percentage, and substantially more walks than strikeouts (740 to 291).[150][190][193] Robinson was one of only two players during the span of 1947–56 to accumulate at least 125 steals while registering a slugging percentage over .425 (Minnie Miñoso was the other).[194] He accumulated 197 stolen bases in total,[150] including 19 steals of home. None of the latter were double steals (in which a player stealing home is assisted by a player stealing another base at the same time).[195] Robinson has been referred to by author David Falkner as "the father of modern base-stealing".[196]

text:
"I'm not concerned with your liking or disliking me ... all I ask is that you respect me as a human being."

—Robinson, on his legacy[142]

tag: div

text: Historical statistical analysis indicates Robinson was an outstanding fielder throughout his ten years in the major leagues and at virtually every position he played.[197] After playing his rookie season at first base,[85] Robinson spent most of his career as a second baseman.[198] He led the league in fielding among second basemen in 1950 and 1951.[199][200] Toward the end of his career, he played about 2,000 innings at third base and about 1,175 innings in the outfield, excelling at both.[197]

text: Assessing himself, Robinson said, "I'm not concerned with your liking or disliking me ... all I ask is that you respect me as a human being."[142] Regarding Robinson's qualities on the field, Leo Durocher said, "Ya want a guy that comes to play. This guy didn't just come to play. He come to beat ya. He come to stuff the goddamn bat right up your ass."[201]

text: Portrayals on stage, film and television

text: Robinson portrayed himself in the 1950 motion picture The Jackie Robinson Story.[202] Other portrayals include:

text:
John Lafayette, in the 1978 ABC television special "A Home Run for Love" (broadcast as an ABC Afterschool Special).[203]
David Alan Grier, in the 1981 Broadway production of the musical The First.[204][205][206]
Michael-David Gordon, in the 1989 Off-Broadway production of the musical Play to Win.[207]
Andre Braugher, in the 1990 TNT television movie The Court-Martial of Jackie Robinson.[208][209]
Blair Underwood, in the 1996 HBO television movie Soul of the Game.[210][211]
Antonio Todd in "Colors", a 2005 episode of the CBS television series Cold Case.[212]
Chadwick Boseman, in the 2013 motion picture 42.[213][214][215][216]

tag: ul

text: Robinson was also the subject of a 2016 PBS documentary, Jackie Robinson, which was directed by Ken Burns and features Jamie Foxx doing voice-over as Robinson.[217]

text: Post-baseball life

text: Robinson once told future Hall of Fame inductee Hank Aaron that "the game of baseball is great, but the greatest thing is what you do after your career is over."[218] Robinson retired from baseball at age 37 on January 5, 1957.[219] Later that year, after he complained of numerous physical ailments, his doctors diagnosed him with diabetes, a disease that also afflicted his brothers.[220] Although Robinson adopted an insulin injection regimen, the state of medicine at the time could not prevent the continued deterioration of Robinson's physical condition from the disease.[221]

text: In his first year of eligibility for the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1962,[66] Robinson encouraged voters to consider only his on-field qualifications, rather than his cultural impact on the game.[222] He was elected on the first ballot, becoming the first black player inducted into the Cooperstown museum.[21]

text: In 1965, Robinson served as an analyst for ABC's Major League Baseball Game of the Week telecasts, the first black person to do so.[223] In 1966, Robinson was hired as general manager for the short-lived Brooklyn Dodgers of the Continental Football League.[224][225] In 1972, he served as a part-time commentator on Montreal Expos telecasts.[226]

text: On June 4, 1972, the Dodgers retired his uniform number, 42, alongside those of Roy Campanella (39) and Sandy Koufax (32).[227] From 1957 to 1964, Robinson was the vice president for personnel at Chock full o'Nuts; he was the first black person to serve as vice president of a major American corporation.[21][228] Robinson always considered his business career as advancing the cause of black people in commerce and industry.[229] Robinson also chaired the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People's (NAACP) million-dollar Freedom Fund Drive in 1957, and served on the organization's board until 1967.[228] In 1964, he helped found, with Harlem businessman Dunbar McLaurin, Freedom National Bank—a black-owned and operated commercial bank based in Harlem.[228] He also served as the bank's first chairman of the board.[230] In 1970, Robinson established the Jackie Robinson Construction Company to build housing for low-income families.[228][231]

text: Robinson was active in politics throughout his post-baseball life. He identified himself as a political independent,[232][233] although he held conservative opinions on several issues, including the Vietnam War (he once wrote to Martin Luther King, Jr. to defend the Johnson Administration's military policy).[234] After supporting Richard Nixon in his 1960 presidential race against John F. Kennedy, Robinson later praised Kennedy effusively for his stance on civil rights.[235] Robinson was angered by conservative Republican opposition to the Civil Rights Act of 1964, though a higher percentage of Democrats voted against it in both the House and Senate. He became one of six national directors for Nelson Rockefeller's unsuccessful campaign to be nominated as the Republican candidate for the 1964 presidential election.[228] After the party nominated Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona instead, Robinson left the party's convention commenting that he now had "a better understanding of how it must have felt to be a Jew in Hitler's Germany".[236] He later became special assistant for community affairs when Rockefeller was re-elected governor of New York in 1966.[228] Switching his allegiance to the Democrats, he subsequently supported Hubert Humphrey against Nixon in 1968.[186]

text: Robinson protested against the major leagues' ongoing lack of minority managers and central office personnel, and he turned down an invitation to appear in an old-timers' game at Yankee Stadium in 1969.[238] He made his final public appearance on October 15, 1972, throwing the ceremonial first pitch before Game 2 of the World Series at Riverfront Stadium in Cincinnati. He gratefully accepted a plaque honoring the twenty-fifth anniversary of his MLB debut, but also commented, "I'm going to be tremendously more pleased and more proud when I look at that third base coaching line one day and see a black face managing in baseball."[239][240] This wish was only fulfilled after Robinson's death: following the 1974 season, the Cleveland Indians gave their managerial post to Frank Robinson (no relation to Jackie), a Hall of Fame-bound player who would go on to manage three other teams. Despite the success of these two Robinsons and other black players, the number of African-American players in Major League Baseball has declined since the 1970s.[241][242]

text: Family life and death

text: After Robinson's retirement from baseball, his wife Rachel Robinson pursued a career in academic nursing. She became an assistant professor at the Yale School of Nursing and director of nursing at the Connecticut Mental Health Center.[243] She also served on the board of the Freedom National Bank until it closed in 1990.[244] She and Jackie had three children: Jackie Robinson Jr. (1946–1971), Sharon Robinson (b. 1950), and David Robinson (b. 1952).[245]

text: Robinson's eldest son, Jackie Robinson Jr., had emotional trouble during his childhood and entered special education at an early age.[246] He enrolled in the Army in search of a disciplined environment, served in the Vietnam War, and was wounded in action on November 19, 1965.[247] After his discharge, he struggled with drug problems. Robinson Jr. eventually completed the treatment program at Daytop Village in Seymour, Connecticut, and became a counselor at the institution.[248] On June 17, 1971, he was killed in an automobile accident at age 24.[249][250] The experience with his son's drug addiction turned Robinson Sr. into an avid anti-drug crusader toward the end of his life.[251]

text: Robinson did not long outlive his son. Complications from heart disease and diabetes weakened Robinson and made him almost blind by middle age. On October 24, 1972, nine days after his appearance at the World Series, Robinson died of a heart attack at his home on 95 Cascade Road in North Stamford, Connecticut; he was 53 years old.[85][249] Robinson's funeral service on October 27, 1972, at Upper Manhattan's Riverside Church adjacent to Grant's Tomb in Morningside Heights, attracted 2,500 mourners.[252][253] Many of his former teammates and other famous baseball players served as pallbearers, and the Rev. Jesse Jackson gave the eulogy.[252] Tens of thousands of people lined the subsequent procession route to Robinson's interment site at Cypress Hills Cemetery in Brooklyn, New York, where he was buried next to his son Jackie and mother-in-law Zellee Isum.[252] Twenty-five years after Robinson's death, the Interboro Parkway was renamed the Jackie Robinson Parkway in his memory. This parkway bisects the cemetery in close proximity to Robinson's gravesite.[254]

text: After Robinson's death, his widow founded the Jackie Robinson Foundation, and she remains an officer as of 2015.[255] On April 15, 2008, she announced that in 2010 the foundation will be opening a museum devoted to Jackie in Lower Manhattan.[256] Robinson's daughter, Sharon, became a midwife, educator, director of educational programming for MLB, and the author of two books about her father.[257] His youngest son, David, who has six children, is a coffee grower and social activist in Tanzania.[258][259]

text: Awards and recognition

text: According to a poll conducted in 1947, Robinson was the second most popular man in the country, behind Bing Crosby.[260] In 1999, he was named by Time on its list of the 100 most influential people of the 20th century.[261] Also in 1999, he ranked number 44 on the Sporting News list of Baseball's 100 Greatest Players[262] and was elected to the Major League Baseball All-Century Team as the top vote-getter among second basemen.[263] Baseball writer Bill James, in The New Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract, ranked Robinson as the 32nd greatest player of all time strictly on the basis of his performance on the field, noting that he was one of the top players in the league throughout his career.[264] Robinson was among the 25 charter members of UCLA's Athletics Hall of Fame in 1984.[43] In 2002, Molefi Kete Asante included Robinson on his list of 100 Greatest African Americans.[265] Robinson has also been honored by the United States Postal Service on three separate postage stamps, in 1982, 1999, and 2000.[266]

text: The City of Pasadena has recognized Robinson in several ways. Brookside Park, situated next to the Rose Bowl, features a baseball diamond and stadium named Jackie Robinson Field.[267] The city's Human Services Department operates the Jackie Robinson Center, a community outreach center that provides health services.[268] In 1997, a $325,000 bronze sculpture (equal to $484,873 today) by artists Ralph Helmick, Stu Schecter, and John Outterbridge depicting oversized nine-foot busts of Robinson and his brother Mack was erected at Garfield Avenue, across from the main entrance of Pasadena City Hall; a granite footprint lists multiple donors to the commission project, which was organized by the Robinson Memorial Foundation and supported by members of the Robinson family.[269][270]

text: Major League Baseball has honored Robinson many times since his death. In 1987, both the National and American League Rookie of the Year Awards were renamed the "Jackie Robinson Award" in honor of the first recipient (Robinson's Major League Rookie of the Year Award in 1947 encompassed both leagues).[271][272] On April 15, 1997, Robinson's jersey number, 42, was retired throughout Major League Baseball, the first time any jersey number had been retired throughout one of the four major American sports leagues. Under the terms of the retirement, a grandfather clause allowed the handful of players who wore number 42 to continue doing so in tribute to Robinson, until such time as they subsequently changed teams or jersey numbers.[273] This affected players such as the Mets' Butch Huskey and Boston's Mo Vaughn. The Yankees' Mariano Rivera, who retired at the end of the 2013 season,[274][275] was the last player in Major League Baseball to wear jersey number 42 on a regular basis. Since 1997, only Wayne Gretzky's number 99, retired by the NHL in 2000, has been retired league-wide.[276] There have also been calls for MLB to retire number 21 league-wide in honor of Roberto Clemente, a sentiment opposed by the Robinson family.[277] The Hispanics Across America advocacy group wants Clemente's number set aside the way the late Robinson's No. 42 was in 1997, but Sharon Robinson maintained the position that such an honor should remain in place for Jackie Robinson only.

text: As an exception to the retired-number policy, MLB began honoring Robinson by allowing players to wear number 42 on April 15, Jackie Robinson Day, which is an annual observance that started in 2004.[278][279] For the 60th anniversary of Robinson's major league debut, MLB invited players to wear the number 42 on Jackie Robinson Day in 2007.[278] The gesture was originally the idea of outfielder Ken Griffey, Jr., who sought Rachel Robinson's permission to wear the number.[280] After receiving her permission, Commissioner Bud Selig not only allowed Griffey to wear the number, but also extended an invitation to all major league teams to do the same.[281] Ultimately, more than 200 players wore number 42, including the entire rosters of the Los Angeles Dodgers, New York Mets, Houston Astros, Philadelphia Phillies, St. Louis Cardinals, Milwaukee Brewers, and Pittsburgh Pirates.[278] The tribute was continued in 2008, when, during games on April 15, all members of the Mets, Cardinals, Washington Nationals, and Tampa Bay Rays wore Robinson's number 42.[282][283] On June 25, 2008, MLB installed a new plaque for Robinson at the Baseball Hall of Fame commemorating his off-the-field impact on the game as well as his playing statistics.[222] In 2009, all uniformed personnel (players, managers, coaches, and umpires) wore number 42 on April 15.[284]

text: At the November 2006 groundbreaking for Citi Field, the new ballpark for the New York Mets, it was announced that the main entrance, modeled on the one in Brooklyn's old Ebbets Field, would be called the Jackie Robinson Rotunda. The rotunda was dedicated at the opening of Citi Field on April 16, 2009.[285] It honors Robinson with large quotations spanning the inner curve of the facade and features a large freestanding statue of his number, 42, which has become an attraction in itself. Mets owner Fred Wilpon announced that the Mets—in conjunction with Citigroup and the Jackie Robinson Foundation—will create a Jackie Robinson Museum and Learning Center, located at the headquarters of the Jackie Robinson Foundation at One Hudson Square, along Canal Street in lower Manhattan. Along with the museum, scholarships will be awarded to "young people who live by and embody Jackie's ideals."[286][287][288] The museum hopes to open by 2019.[289] At Dodger Stadium in Los Angeles, a statue of Robinson was introduced in 2017.[290]

text: Since 2004, the Aflac National High School Baseball Player of the Year has been presented the "Jackie Robinson Award".[291]

text: Robinson has also been recognized outside of baseball. In December 1956, the NAACP recognized him with the Spingarn Medal, which it awards annually for the highest achievement by an African-American.[228] President Ronald Reagan posthumously awarded Robinson the Presidential Medal of Freedom on March 26, 1984,[292] and on March 2, 2005, President George W. Bush gave Robinson's widow the Congressional Gold Medal, the highest civilian award bestowed by Congress; Robinson was only the second baseball player to receive the award, after Roberto Clemente.[293] On August 20, 2007, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and his wife, Maria Shriver, announced that Robinson was inducted into the California Hall of Fame, located at The California Museum for History, Women and the Arts in Sacramento.[294]

text: A number of buildings have been named in Robinson's honor. The UCLA Bruins baseball team plays in Jackie Robinson Stadium,[295] which, because of the efforts of Jackie's brother Mack, features a memorial statue of Robinson by sculptor Richard H. Ellis.[296] The stadium also unveiled a new mural of Robinson by Mike Sullivan on April 14, 2013. City Island Ballpark in Daytona Beach, Florida was renamed Jackie Robinson Ballpark in 1990 and a statue of Robinson with two children stands in front of the ballpark. His wife Rachel was present for the dedication on September 15. 1990.[297][298] A number of facilities at Pasadena City College (successor to PJC) are named in Robinson's honor, including Robinson Field, a football/soccer/track facility named jointly for Robinson and his brother Mack.[299] The New York Public School system has named a middle school after Robinson,[300] and Dorsey High School plays at a Los Angeles football stadium named after him.[301] In 1976, his home in Brooklyn, the Jackie Robinson House, was declared a National Historic Landmark.[302] Brooklyn residents want to turn his home into a city landmark.[303] Robinson also has an asteroid named after him, 4319 Jackierobinson.[304] In 1997, the United States Mint issued a Jackie Robinson commemorative silver dollar, and five-dollar gold coin.[305] That same year, New York City renamed the Interboro Parkway in his honor.

text: In 2011, the U.S. placed a plaque at Robinson's Montreal home to honor the ending of segregation in baseball.[306] The house, on 8232 avenue de Gaspé near Jarry Park, was Robinson's residence when he played for the Montreal Royals during 1946. In a letter read during the ceremony, Rachel Robinson, Jackie's widow, wrote: "I remember Montreal and that house very well and have always had warm feeling for that great city. Before Jack and I moved to Montreal, we had just been through some very rough treatment in the racially biased South during spring training in Florida. In the end, Montreal was the perfect place for him to get his start. We never had a threatening or unpleasant experience there. The people were so welcoming and saw Jack as a player and as a man."[307]

text: On November 22, 2014, UCLA announced that it would officially retire the number 42 across all university sports, effective immediately. While Robinson wore several different numbers during his UCLA career, the school chose 42 because it had become indelibly identified with him.[308] The only sport this did not affect was men's basketball, which had previously retired the number for Walt Hazzard (although Kevin Love was actually the last player in that sport to wear 42, with Hazzard's blessing).[309][310][311][312] In a move paralleling that of MLB when it retired the number, UCLA allowed three athletes (in women's soccer, softball, and football) who were already wearing 42 to continue to do so for the remainder of their UCLA careers. The school also announced it would prominently display the number at all of its athletic venues.[308]