Jackie Robinson

Jackie Robinson was a very famous and heroic Major League Baseball (MLB) player. He played many other sports but never professional. He was the first African American person to play in the MLB. Not many people would have thought that he or any African American player would ever play professional sports because not many people respected black people and thought that they should associate themselves with whites, but he did. It took bravery to play in the MLB. It takes perseverance to keep playing with all of the negativity and all the people that wanted him not to play. It took a lot of discipline not to fight with the others. Though he was stronger, Robinson knew that it was wrong and knew that he could not play if he did fight. Robinson was extremely intelligent to be able to play all of the sports that he did. He didn't just play one position in his sports. He typically could play multiple positions if his coach told him to do so.

Jackie Robinson was born on January 31, 1919 in Cairo, Georgia. He had three brothers. Some of which are older and some are younger. He has one younger sister. His father wasn't the most stable man in the world. He ran off with another woman when Jackie was just six months old. Jackie's mother struggled to put food on the table and could barely raise all of her kids.

Jackie (his whole life) was great at sports. He attended Pasadena College. Later he went to UCLA and there he played four sports. He played semi-pro football in Hawaii. In 1942, he was drafted into the army. He didn't stay in the army for long. After that he then played baseball for the KC Monarchs. His heroic dedication to baseball made him able to advance in the social status in his baseball career. He was traded to a better baseball team, the Brooklyn Dodgers

While more people began to know him, not a lot of people knew him as a fantastic baseball player. Most people just saw him as only the first black person to play in the MLB. It took a lot of courage to keep playing in the MLB with all of the discrimination against him. A lot of the players did not think that he should be playing in the same sport as him because they thought that he did not have the right to play with them. People tried to fight him but, like he should've, ignored it and did not fight. It took so much discipline to no fight with all of those people. He would just simply keep playing the sport that he loved. He fought inequality by completely appearing to ignore it.

Self-Discipline, perseverance, bravery, kindness, and intelligence paid off. In Jackie's ten years of playing baseball he won six World Series! That is a huge accomplishment for someone who was so discriminated against. Jackie Robinson had a hard career but a very nice statistical career. He is a great person in American history and will not be forgotten. He was a great man as well as a great athlete. Jackie is a great hero.