The Christian Who Integrated Baseball: Branch Rickey

On this episode of Our American Stories, most Americans know Jackie Robinson as the man who broke Major League Baseball's color barrier. Few know the story of Branch Rickey, the Brooklyn Dodgers executive whose Christian faith convinced him that segregation in baseball was morally wrong and that he had a responsibility to do something about it.

Inspired by Abraham Lincoln and the teachings of Christ, Rickey set out to change America's pastime despite fierce public opposition. Our own Lee Habeeb shares the remarkable story of the man whose convictions helped transform baseball and the country.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:10):
This is Lee Habib and this is our American Stories.
Up next, a sports and baseball story for the ages.

Speaker 2 (00:20):
Jackie Robbinson in nineteen forty seven became the first of
his race to play in the Major League. Branch Rickey
broke down the color barrier when he signed Robbie for
the Brooklyn Dodgers.

Speaker 3 (00:32):
I'll certainly do my very best on the thead.

Speaker 2 (00:35):
I'm very sure you will. Jackie Robinson hit that ball,
Zuman toss eleveel. Yes, yes, Jackie hid that ball.

Speaker 1 (00:50):
But the twenty six thousand plus Brooklyn Dodger diehards gathered
at their home opener on April fifteenth, nineteen forty seven,
what they saw was not merely a solid win. The
Dodgers beat the Braves five to three. What they witnessed
with sports history is Jackie Robinson took to Ebotts Field

(01:10):
to become the first black player to play for a
Major League baseball team in the twentieth century. We correctly
celebrate Robinson's story, but what compelled the man who hired Robinson,
branch Rickey, to integrate the game he loved When he
accepted the job as general manager and president of a

(01:31):
major league baseball team in the most populated borough in
America's biggest city. There wasn't a black player in any
professional sport. The NFL was not nearly the national franchise
it is today in the NBA. Even less so, baseball
wasn't just the biggest national sport, it was the only

(01:55):
national sport. The denizens of Brooklyn, well, they weren't crying
out for an hour. Indeed, fierce racism intention existed between
and among the many ethnic groups crammed into those Brooklyn
neighborhoods surrounding ebbetts Field. When Ricky landed that job in

(02:15):
nineteen forty two, he arrived in Brooklyn after assembling a
team that had won six penance in Saint Louis. But
he considered his tenure there of failure because he couldn't
get the Cardinal owners to integrate the stands, let alone
the baseball field.

Speaker 2 (02:34):
But if the right man an ability on the field
and with control of himself off the field, if I
could find that kind of a man, the American public
would accept. I felt that there was that kind of
sportsmanship in America that would not turn thumbs down on
a Negro of high intelligence, a fine character and of

(02:54):
great physical skill.

Speaker 1 (02:56):
Why did branch Ricky risk his new high profile jet
to do what he did? I quote author Eric me
Texas for starters. He was a Bible thumping Methodist who
refused to attend games on Sundays. He sincerely believed it
was God's will that he integrate baseball, and it was

(03:18):
an opportunity to intervene in the moral history of the nation,
as Lincoln had done. That sentiment was echoed in sportswriter
Jimmy Breslin's twoy eleven biography of Ricky. He carries with
him a Midwestern Christian religious fervor as strong as a
wheat crop, and the political faith anything Republican. The ambitious

(03:45):
Dodgers executive had an inauspicious beginning. He was born on
a farm in southern Ohio in eighteen eighty one to
parents known for their religious piety. He played baseball and
football at Ohio Wesleyan University, a college with Methodist roots,
But it was in his role as baseball team captain

(04:07):
and coach that he encountered racism in a visceral and
personal way. When his black teammate, Charles Thomas, was refused
entry to a hotel in self Bend, Indiana. Ricky convinced
the manager to allow Thomas to stay in his room
as an unregistered guest, but not without a serious shouting

(04:28):
match the jure crowd. Ricky's memory of his friend Thomas
lying on the hotel bed crying out, it's my skin.
If I could just tear it off, I'd be like
everybody else. Those words haunted Ricky. When he first interviewed

(04:49):
Jackie Robinson for the job, he pulled out a book
by Giovanni Pappini called Life of Christ. He read from
Matthew Fi I have thirty nine. Whoever shall smite thee
on my right cheek turned to him the other Also, no.

Speaker 2 (05:08):
Player in the history of baseball I think was ever
subjected to the vile baiting for opposing ventures basically unkind
criticisms in print. He played admirably in spite of it all.
He really turned the other cheek. He is a credit
to baseball and to America.

Speaker 1 (05:29):
Ricky then read from Matthew five forty four, Love your
enemies and pray for those who persecute you. Ricky believed
in the power of those words. He hired Robinson because
he believed in the power of those words too.

Speaker 3 (05:47):
When I walked in the door, I had no idea
why I was being brought into the office. And then
they have him sit and tell me exactly why, and
then they go through all of the kinds of things
that he envisioned, the prospects of violence and everything, and
how I have to control myself. And it was a
meeting that I shall never forget, and a meeting has

(06:08):
started May thinking that this was perhaps one of the
truly great Americans of our time.

Speaker 1 (06:13):
Robinson's faith was cultivated by his mother, whom his wife
Mally described as a courageous, determined woman who told her
children God would always take care of them. Prayer sustain Robinson.
His habit of kneeling at his bedside each night to
pray was quote the best way to get closer to God,

(06:36):
and he'd often add with a wry smile and a
hard hit ball. Robinson hit many hard hit balls, once
batting three forty two to win a league title. He
led Brooklyn to six penance and a World Series, and
he was inducted into the Hall of Fame in nineteen

(06:56):
sixty two. Branch Rickie followed in nineteen six Without God,
the story of Robinson and Ricky wouldn't just be incomplete,
it would be incoherent. Leaving Jesus out of their story
would be like leaving Hamburgers out of Ray CrOx or
race cars out of Mario and Treddi's.

Speaker 2 (07:17):
Well.

Speaker 3 (07:17):
Mister Ricky, I just want to say that I think
you know how I feel. I sincerely want to say
that I hope that God gives you many, many more
years of successful effort here in this country of ours.

Speaker 1 (07:29):
I thank you.

Speaker 2 (07:30):
I mean, if your kind words must be somewhat extravagant
because of our long and pleasant personal.

Speaker 1 (07:37):
Relationship, Robinson and Ricky's obedience to God's call on their
lives was the source of great personal suffering. This was
not a case, as theologian Dietrich Bonaffer called it, of
quote cheap grace unquote, It came at great personal cost.
Robinson said these words not long before he died. A

(08:01):
life is not important except in the impact it has
on others.

Speaker 3 (08:06):
I work for a great guy. I don't think anybody
could have done the job had it not been for
mister Rickey. He was constantly advising and guiding, and I
had so much confidence in him. I would have jumped
off the bridge if he told me to do it.
That's how much I believed in him. And he was
a man who was sincere and dedicated and willing to
lend that helping hand that so needed today in terms

(08:28):
of the problems that we face in everyday life.

Speaker 1 (08:30):
One life impacted by Robinson's was the Reverend Martin Luther
King Juniors, who said about Robinson, Without him, I would
never have been able to do what I did. Robinson
and Ricky, through their love of Jesus, affected millions of lives,
forever changing baseball and America.

Speaker 2 (08:51):
It's an honorable profession. Many a boy can be properly
advised to elect it as a career. Some should not,
But it is in our country. It has been to
me a way of life, a charming challenge that comes
from a little oddgect a little round ball made up

(09:14):
of rubber inside and the yarn about it, and parside
covered with one hundred and sixty two stitches, or.

Speaker 1 (09:21):
What have you.

Speaker 2 (09:22):
What is it that would challenge the interest of a
man for fifty eight years? I tell you it has
blessed me. I bless it. It has blessed our country,
and our country must bless it as it must, all
of its recreations. We need it badly.

Speaker 1 (09:48):
The story of Jackie Robinson and the man who hired
him branch rickey. Here on our American stories