Jackie Robinson

New Book Examines Jackie Robinson's Dedication to Civil Rights

by Aram Goudsouzian

Unlike a typical biography, Kostya Kennedy's "True: The Four Seasons of Jackie Robinson" looks at four years of the baseball legend's life and his changin civil rights advocacy.

Ketanji Brown Jackson's Forbearance Echoed Jackie Robinson Before HUAC

by Bruce W. Dearstyne

In a Congressional hearing intended to sow guilt by association between civil rights and global communism, the baseball great refused to take the bait, keeping the focus on the need for justice and fairness in America.

“White Fragility” Gets Jackie Robinson's Story Wrong

by Peter Dreier

In an effort to define the Major League Color Line as an artifact of white prejudice, Robin DiAngelo obscures the fact that Jackie Robinson was part of a broad protest movement by Black activists and some white allies to demand and achieve integration of professional baseball. 

If only Richard Nixon had Listened to Jackie Robinson — The GOP Might be Doing Better than Trump Today

by Paul Kendrick and Stephen Kendrick

Despite Jackie Robinson's intercession, Richard Nixon's moment of indecision in 1960 allowed Jack Kennedy to connect his campaign with the cause of Martin Luther King and civil rights. 

Malcolm X Warned Us about the Pitfalls of Black Celebrities as Leaders

by Kyle T. Mays

The media’s overemphasis on the voices of Black celebrities obscures the voices of ordinary Black people, whose lives are vastly different from those who have wealth and visibility.

The first African American major league baseball player isn’t who you think

As the country celebrates Jackie Robinson Day, let’s consider the career of Fleet Walker.

How Jackie Robinson’s wife, Rachel, helped him break baseball’s color line

by Chris Lamb

"She had to live through the death threats, endure the vile screams of the fans and watch her husband get knocked down by pitch after pitch. … She was beautiful and wise and replenished his strength and courage.”

Reflections on Jackie Robinson's Legacy on His 100th Birthday

Through images and personal essays by longtime New York Times writers, a vivid look at the man who made baseball truly American.

Before Trump vs. the NFL, there was Jackie Robinson vs. JFK

Jackie Robinson, the hero who integrated Major League Baseball in 1947, spoke out loudly for civil rights and challenged President John F. Kennedy to stop dithering on black equality. Unlike Trump, JFK sought to understand Robinson’s complaints.

How politics played a major role in the signing of Jackie Robinson

by Chris Lamb

Beginning in the 1930s, black sportswriters, notably Wendell Smith and Sam Lacy, made baseball part of a larger crusade to confront Jim Crow laws.

Jackie Robinson: Militant Black Republican

by Leah Wright Rigueur

“I’m a black man first, an American second, and then I will support a political party—third,” said Robinson in 1968.

Ken Burns's "Jackie Robinson" celebrates American hero

Jackie Robinson was not the best baseball player who ever lived, but renowned filmmaker Ken Burnsmakes a strong argument that he was the most important one.

Video of the Week: Ken Burns Talks Race and Jackie Robinson

Ken Burns explains how race is the common thread in all of his work, and why Jackie Robinson’s story is still so relevant.

Here Is What Can Make a Difference in Race Relations – And It Happened in Major League Baseball Decades Ago

by Michael H. Ebner

The obituary a few weeks ago of a former major league baseball player – George Shuba – has furnished a useful lesson about race.

Jackie Robinson and Nixon: Life and Death of a Political Friendship

by Michael Beschloss

In 1960, Robinson endorsed Nixon for president, declaring that the civil rights commitment of Nixon’s Democratic rival, John F. Kennedy, was “insincere.”

You Know Jackie Robinson, but Shouldn't We Remember Moses Fleetwood Walker, too?

by Michael H. Ebner

Moses Fleetwood Walker should not be regarded as a trivial footnote.

Ron Briley: Review of "Beyond Home Plate: Jackie Robinson on Life After Baseball," edited by Michael Long

The courage and athletic ability demonstrated by Jackie Robinson in breaking Major League Baseball’s color line in 1947 and making the Brooklyn Dodgers a dominant National League club during the 1950s resulted in the ballplayer’s induction into the pantheon of baseball immortals at the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York. Robinson’s career after he retired from the sport following the 1956 season is, however, less well known, but Robinson’s decision to take an active role in the civil rights movement provides ample proof that the courage displayed on the playing field carried over into the struggle for a democratic nation freed from the scourge of racial discrimination and segregation.

Sanford, Fla., Threatened to Lynch Jackie Robinson

by Peter Dreier

Neither of the Robinsons would ever forget their Florida ordeal.

How Accurate is "42"?

by Ron Briley

Gene Seymour: What the Jackie Robinson Film Leaves Out

Gene Seymour spent more than thirty years writing for daily newspapers, eighteen of them as a movie critic and feature writer for Newsday. He has been published in Film Comment, The Nation, Washington Spectator, Los Angeles Times and American History.The 24-hour news cycle yielded one of its better sitcom interludes last week when Rand Paul went to Howard University, the historically black college, to tell its student body why it needed the Republican Party. The libertarian junior senator from Kentucky, at one point, asked for a show-of-hands from those who knew that most of the African Americans who founded the NAACP more than 100 years ago were Republican. When several dozen hands shot up, Paul insisted he wasn’t condescending to them, saying, “I don’t know what you know.” You won’t get a better title for this sitcom than that.