| In our daily lives, we often tend to take the familiar for | | | | leagues, and that all the players needed was the |
| granted, and mistake what we see around us for the | | | | opportunity to show what they could do. All Rickey |
| natural order of things. Doing so, we miss not only | | | | needed was the right player. |
| many opportunities for changing the world for the | | | | As the author shows, Jackie Robinson was not the |
| better; we also miss the chance to bring perspective | | | | calm, untroubled athlete of myth we see in the history |
| to the ebb and flow of events, and to understand how | | | | books. He was, instead, an angry man, embittered by |
| the world is constantly changing around us. | | | | the racial injustice around him and fiercely determined |
| Change itself is rarely easy, and it is not always for the | | | | to prove himself as a man and as an athlete. He was |
| better. But sometimes, the painful process of change | | | | also, in the end, the perfect choice for Rickey's daring |
| can reveal what is noble in the human soul. In Opening | | | | experiment. Proud and defiant, Robinson was tough |
| Day, author Jonathan Eig tells the story of the year | | | | enough to withstand the pressures that inevitably |
| that saw Jackie Robinson change the face of Major | | | | followed the attempt to break the color barrier. He had, |
| League baseball-and open doors of opportunity for | | | | as a captain in the Army, faced a court-martial rather |
| countless men and women across the country, whose | | | | than back down when a white private rudely ordered |
| only disability was the hatred and bigotry that arose | | | | him to the back of a bus. But when, still unsure of |
| due to a difference in their skin pigmentation. It is a tale | | | | Rickey's intentions, Robinson asked whether the |
| everyone knows, but nobody really understands. And | | | | Brooklyn owner was looking for someone who |
| the book is an exquisite and inspiring exposition of how | | | | wouldn't fight back, Rickey replied that what he |
| mere mortals can overcome adversity with courage | | | | needed was someone "with the courage not to." |
| and determination. | | | | Though initially unsure of the support he would get |
| The year 1947 found American a different country | | | | from the front office, once Robinson saw the lengths |
| than it is today. Segregation laws, in place throughout | | | | to which the Brooklyn management would go to quell |
| the South, were at odds with the ideals of American | | | | dissent from the southerners on the team over his |
| democracy, and many returning veterans---Americans | | | | presence---and that even an early-season slump didn't |
| who had answered the call of duty to protect their | | | | provide an excuse to have him riding the bench for the |
| country and all it stood for---found themselves | | | | rest of the season---he started to relax enough to play |
| relegated to back doors, segregated slums, and | | | | his own brand of baseball. It as a style that was fiery |
| separate drinking fountains, all to indulge the sensibilities | | | | and combative, for though he had promised Branch |
| of the grandchildren of slave-owners, whose views on | | | | Rickey that he would do nothing to give the bigots and |
| racial purity were not terribly different from those who | | | | hate-mongers anything to attack, he found that he |
| operated the camps and ovens liberated in 1945, which | | | | could release his passions and resentments in the best |
| had so shocked and horrified the world. | | | | way possible: by proving himself on the field. |
| One such returning veteran was a well-educated and | | | | And in the end, Jackie Robinson electrified crowds |
| powerfully-built college graduate named Jack | | | | throughout the country. His exploits on the field did |
| Roosevelt Robinson. An athletic standout at UCLA, he | | | | more to open eyes to the wealth of talent that our old |
| excelled in football and basketball, and in a different era | | | | attitudes and prejudices were holding back than any |
| would have already been a national sensation with his | | | | number of lectures on human rights the brotherhood of |
| breathtaking skills and fierce competitive instincts. But | | | | man. And as the season unfolded, all fair-minded men |
| this was before the age of fat TV contracts and | | | | and women-of all races-were captivated by the |
| padded athletic salaries: athletes were not yet media | | | | human drama unfolding before their eyes: a man, with |
| darlings, but were simply considered hired help. And | | | | nothing but his dignity and talent, standing tall against |
| mainstream American sports did not reflect the full | | | | hate and intolerance, and leading his team to a |
| spectrum of color. Like American society itself, sports | | | | championship through his bravery on the field and off. |
| were segregated by race---and baseball, a sport | | | | Tightly written, and woven around the personalities of |
| whose culture in post-war America was decidedly | | | | the participants, Opening Day reads more like a novel |
| Southern, seemed an unlikely place to begin the | | | | than as a biography. Robinson himself is shown not as |
| process of integration. And at first blush, Robinson | | | | the saintly figure often depicted in baseball legend, but |
| seemed an unlikely candidate for the job of racial | | | | with all his pride and anger intact. In the end, the story it |
| ground-breaker: baseball was not even his best sport. | | | | tells set the foundation for the Civil Rights movement |
| But Brooklyn was itself something of a melting pot: | | | | that followed two decades later. It makes the saga |
| immigrants of all kinds made it an amalgam of all things | | | | richer, more human-and, by acknowledging the struggle |
| American, and the Brooklyn Dodgers---a collection of | | | | between the needs of the moment and Robinson's |
| misfits and oddballs that seemed at once distinctly | | | | all-too-human shortcomings, it serves to reveal just |
| New York, but typically American---had a visionary | | | | how heroic a figure he was. It shows that courage |
| owner who was seized by the notion that doing what | | | | often consists of more than taking a bold stand for |
| he knew was "the right thing" would help his team by | | | | principle: sometimes, the most courageous among us |
| reaping an untapped reservoir of talent that was being | | | | are those who refuse to surrender to our emotions, |
| unfairly denied the chance to shine. Branch Rickey, the | | | | and resist the instinct to lash out at those who taunt us. |
| Brooklyn owner who was determined to break the | | | | It is a lesson that would make for a better, nobler |
| color barrier, secretly set about scouting the old Negro | | | | world if more of us could follow the lead set by the |
| league for the best players he could find, convinced | | | | hero of the story; the world we see today shows just |
| that the time was right for integrating the major | | | | how far short we fall of his example. |
