PHILIP A. FARRUGGIO—Playing second base, in close proximity to the other team’s bench, Jackie could not help but be overwhelmed by the profanities. They questioned his manhood, his sexuality, his wife and family…. nothing was spared that day. As the story goes, when it was time for the Dodgers to return to their own bench, Jackie was boiling! Though he had gone through this kind of thing many times, this day the assaults were “crossing the line”. Jackie, when he signed with Brooklyn in ‘ 47, had given his word to Branch Rickey, the Dodger General Mgr. The agreement was that he would never once respond either physically or verbally to any racist attacks on his person. Rickey knew that Jackie, a college graduate and veteran army officer, had a certain sustenance that many men, regardless of race, could not or would not summon up, that inner resource to ‘take it’.
