JACKIE ROBINSON BORN IN GEORGIA
Cairo, Georgia (JFK+50) One hundred years ago, January 31, 1919, future major league baseball star Jackie Roosevelt Robinson* was born here in Cairo**. Jackie's middle name was chosen in honor of Theodore Roosevelt who passed away less than a month before his birth.
Jackie attended Pasadena Jr. College and transferred to UCLA where he became the first athlete at the school to letter in four sports: basketball, baseball, football and track.
Jackie Robinson's major league baseball career (1947-1956) included a .311 batting average, 1518 hits, 137 HRs, 734 RBIs and 197 stolen bases. He was Rookie of the Year 1947 and six times an All-Star. Robinson was inducted in the Hall of Fame in 1962. His jersey #42 was retired by every MLB team.
In 1963, a telegram was sent to President John F. Kennedy by Jackie Robinson urging him to protect civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr.*** Mr. Robinson wrote...
"It might seem fantastic to imagine that even in the state of Mississippi anyone would seek to do injury to a non-violent leader like Martin Luther King (but) should harm come to Dr. King...the restraint of many people...might burst its bonds and bring about a brutal bloody holocaust the like of which this country has not seen. I...implore you...to utilize every federal facility to protect a man sorely needed for this era."
*Jackie Roosevelt Robinson (1919-1972), the 1st African-American to play in MLBB. JRR served in WWII & played baseball for the Kansas City Monarchs in the Negro Leagues before being chosen by Branch Rickey to play for the Brooklyn Dodgers.
**Cairo, Georgia is located in Grady County North of the Florida state line. The city was founded in 1835. It was named after the city in Egypt.
***Dr. King was scheduled to attend the funeral of civil rights activist Medgar Evers who had been killed in Jackson, Mississippi 3 days earlier.
SOURCE
"Jackie Robinson to JFK in 1963 telegram: Rev King needs more protection in Miss," by Victoria Taylor, New York Daily News, September 4, 2013, www.nydailynews.com
Jackie Robinson
Brooklyn Dodgers
Look Magazine (1984)
Library of Congress Image
