Rick Teverbaugh
rick.teverbaugh@heraldbulletin.com
While baseball celebrates Jackie Robinson breaking the sport’s color barrier, an eyewitness to that history finds the event to be much more widespread.
Anderson’s own Carl Erskine was a teammate of Robinson’s in Brooklyn, joining the Dodgers at the ripe age of 21 just a year after Robinson became the first black player in the major leagues.
“The stage was perfect,” said Erskine. “Baseball wasn’t political. You didn’t have to have a bankroll to make the team. You had to prove you belonged. So they put Jackie on the field and what did he do? He caught the ball, hit the ball, outran the ball and did everything he was supposed to do.”
Even though baseball was ready to take in at least one black player in 1947, getting the rest of the country to warm up to the idea was an even bigger challenge.
“I think baseball was fast to accept, but America was slow,” said Erskine. “It took seven years for the last major league hotel to accept black players after Jackie started playing. Even then they couldn’t eat in the dining room. They had to have room service. That was the Chase Hotel in St. Louis.”
Robinson had to endure volatile fan reactions along the way. But Branch Rickey, president and general manager of the team, felt he had chosen the right player to get the job done.
Rickey had a message to Robinson. “Mr. Rickey said, ‘You’re strong enough to whip anybody on the field. But are you strong enough not to fight? Because if you fight, we’ll lose and this whole thing will go down the drain,’” recalled Erskine.
To pound that home, Rickey had a three-year plan to keep Robinson in line.
“He (Robinson) was really a patriotic guy,” said Erskine. “He loved America. He was intelligent. He was patient, but he was a fiery guy inside his gut. He contained himself because the goal was so great.
“Mr. Rickey had a gag order on him for three years. It said he couldn’t retaliate in any way, a look, a motion, a word, nothing. This is how you beat the bully. You don’t fight him. He’ll win if you fight him. You can’t run away or he’ll win. The only way to beat the bully is tell him ‘Hit me again.’ Jackie could do that. I’m not a volatile personality. I don’t think I could have taken what he took and not do something.”
After those first two years, Rickey took off the gag order for the third year.
“Then it just gushed out of him,” Erskine said. “Niagara Falls would take a back seat to the roar from Jackie. It was then that he became controversial and outspoken.”
Erskine believes that Robinson did more than just pave the way for blacks to play big league baseball. Erskine’s son Jimmy has Down syndrome, a condition that in the past might have forced the Erskine family to hide him from a society unwilling to accept people with physical differences.
“Society has changed,” said Erskine. “We’ve become a society of acceptance and inclusion, and we’ve all been enriched because of that. I give credit to this community because people have changed their outlook about people of color and about people who are different.
“People ask what were my biggest thrills. Well, you can point to a lot of games won and pennants and such, but those all kind of take second place. I played baseball at a time when I saw America do something that was significant and good. Then to go through Jimmy’s life and see how people have changed in how they react to people who have all types of handicaps, those two things have been the greatest experiences in my life. When we hold the Special Olympics on April 29 at Anderson University, if Jimmy brings home a gold medal, I think Jackie had something to do with that.”
Erskine was well-prepared for having a black player on his team. One of his best friends throughout most of his life has been Johnny Wilson, a standout player in high school, college and the pros in multiple sports.
“Johnny Wilson and I grew up together and went to Shadeland School together,” said Erskine. “I ate at his house. He ate at my house. Now, at the YMCA in swim programs, blacks couldn’t participate. Johnny never protested, but Jack Rector and I said that if Johnny couldn’t go, we weren’t going.”
Wilson, now living in Pennsylvania and working as an assistant coach for his son at Lock Haven Junior College, remembers that racism wasn’t a big issue around the county when he was growing up.
“Carl, Jack Rector and I played baseball together each summer,” said Wilson. “Carl pitched, Jack was catcher and I played first base. I played all around the county, up in Elwood and everywhere else. Nothing was ever said to me out of the way.”
When Robinson broke through the color barrier, Wilson said, he thought it would lead him in the same direction.
“I thought for sure I’d play baseball,” he said. “I got a tryout with the (St. Louis) Cardinals. I went nine for 11 at the plate with four home runs, two triples and three doubles. They never even asked me my name.”
So Wilson played for the Chicago American Giants in the Negro League 1949 after a great two-sport career at Anderson College. He played at the same time that Willie Mays, Elston Howard and Joe Black, all future major leaguers, were in the league.
But he did experience a lot of the racial slurs that have been well documented in Robinson’s 1947 season.
“In the Negro League, the white fans had to sit in the outfield bleachers where the blacks had to sit for major league games,” said Wilson. “But they would still shout out the same things. The climate in the major leagues was tough for Jackie because a lot of players were from the southern states. That was where they could play pretty much the year around.”
Wilson believes it is high time that Robinson gets his proper amount of respect for what he endured.
“I think it’s a great thing and a long time coming,” said Wilson.
He thinks many of today’s young black athletes are making wrong decisions regarding what sport to pursue.
“There are very few African-Americans in baseball today,” he said. “Black kids today don’t pick up baseball. They pick basketball. Baseball is the greatest game ever I feel. You can be 5-foot and still play baseball. There are more places and opportunities to play baseball.”
One player who can attest to that is Madison Heights graduate Jermaine Allensworth, who was drafted out of Purdue to play baseball. He played four seasons in the majors with Pittsburgh, Kansas City and the New York Mets. He played his final game May 29, 1999.
But he’s still playing and getting paid for it; for a second season, he’ll be in uniform for the Gary South Shore Railcats.
He recalls being told about Jackie Robinson by his coaches and assistants in high school. “He (Robinson) was definitely a pioneer for blacks on the field and off,” said Allensworth. “He was a tremendously strong person to perform the way he did with all that was going on around him.”
Allensworth doesn’t see the prejudice now that he’s sure Robinson endured.
“I wouldn’t say it is ever all of the way gone,” said Allensworth. “But it’s not nearly as evident. It’s hard sometimes but not nearly as hard. We get treated a lot more equally and get a lot more opportunities.”
Those changes started 60 years ago, and the man mostly responsible is being honored today for his courage and perseverance.
