Jackie Robinson was a famous baseball player and a Civil Rights activist. He was the first person to win the varsity letters in four sports – baseball, basketball, football and track at UCLA. He became the first African-American major league baseball player of the modern era in the year 1947. In the same year, he won two prestigious awards such as The Sporting News Rookie of the Year Award and the Rookie of the Year Award. After two years, he received the National League MVP Award. Given below is the Jackie Robinson Timeline, which narrates some important events in his life.
Jackie Robinson Timeline
1919: On January 31, Jackie Robinson was born to Mallie and Jerry Robinson in Cairo, Georgia.
1920: His father deserted the family when he was six months old. His mother, Mallie moved to Pasadena, California along with the family. Jackie was brought up in poverty by a single mother.
1923: Mallie bought a house on the Pepper Street in Pasadena. Jackie joined the Pepper Street Gang of the minority boys and poor whites.
1935: Jackie graduated from Dakota Junior High School and entered in John Muir High School. There, he played from different Muir Tech sport teams. He lettered in four sports such as baseball, basketball, football and track.
1937: Jackie Robinson joined the Pasadena Junior College. He continued to excel in sports. He played safety and quarterbacks for the football team, lead off batter and shortstop for the baseball team and took part in the broad jump.
1938: Jackie Robinson was elected in the All-Southland Junior College Baseball Team. He was chosen as the region’s Most Valuable Player.
1939: He enrolled at the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) and became the first four-sport letterman. He was the highest scorer in the Pacific Coast Conference basketball and national champion long-jumper. Before completion of graduation, Jackie left the college to join a National Youth Administration work camp as an athletic director at Atascadero, California.
1941: Jackie joined the semi-professional integrated Honolulu Bears professional football team.
1942: Jackie was inducted into the United States Army. He was posted at Fort Riley in Kansas with Joe Louis. With the help of Truman Gibson, he was accepted into the Officer’s Candidate School and commissioned as a lieutenant.
1944: In the month of July, he refused an order to ride in the rear of the bus at Fort Hood, Texas. As a result, he had to face a court-martial.
1945: He was discharged from the army because of weak ankles. Then he joined the Negro Leagues and played for the Kansas City Monarchs. Brooklyn Dodgers’ president Branch Rickey, who was searching an ideal black player to break MLB, interviewed Jackie Robinson on August 28. On October 23, Jackie signed the Dodgers’ farm team, the Montreal Royals, in the International League.
1946: Jackie married Rachel Isum and they had a son, Jackie Jr.
1947: Jackie put on the uniform No.42 for his major league debut on April 15 and played his first match for the Montreal Royals against the Boston Braves. He was voted the first major-league rookie of the year. He also received the fifth rank in the National League’s most valuable player voting.
1949: Jackie joined Don Newcombe, Roy Campanella and Larry Doby as the first Afrcian-Americans to play in an All-Star Game.
1957: Jackie Robinson announced his retirement from the major league baseball. He became the Direct of Personnel for Chock Full O’Nuts, a restaurant chain founded by William Black in 1926. Jackie worked with the Harlem YMCA and became the chairman of the Board of Freedom National Bank. He also became the owner of a construction company, which built housing for the blacks. He worked with the Freedom Fund Drive of the NAACP.
1960: Jackie Robinson supported Senator Hubert Humphrey in the primaries. But, he switched to the Republican Party and Richard Nixon for the presidential campaign.
1962: He was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame.
1963: Jackie marched with Martin Luther King in Birmingham, Alabama.
1966: New York governor Nelson Rockefeller appointed him as a Special Assistant for the Community Affairs.
1968: Jackie again supported Hubert Humphrey in the presidential campaign.
1971: His eldest son, Jackie Jr. died in a car accident, after overcoming drug addiction.
1972: Jackie Robinson died of heart attack on October 24 in his home at Stamford, Connecticut.
