In 1945, Jackie Roosevelt Robinson played one season in the Negro Baseball League, traveling all over the Midwest with the Kansas City Monarchs. Little did he know greater challenges and achievements were ahead. In 1947, the Brooklyn Dodgers president Branch Rickey approached Jackie about joining the Brooklyn Dodgers.
On April 15, 1947, Jackie Robinson, at the age of 28, becomes the first African American player in Major League Baseball when he steps onto Ebbets Field in Brooklyn, New York to play for the Brooklyn Dodgers. Robinson broke the color barrier in a sport that had been segregated for more than 50 years. Exactly 50 years later, on April 15, 1997, Robinson’s groundbreaking career was honored and his uniform number, 42, was retired from Major League Baseball by Commissioner Bud Selig in a ceremony attended by over 50,000 fans at New York City’s Shea Stadium. Robinson’s was the first-ever number retired by all teams in the league.
