Sisk: In war and baseball, Gold Medal honoree Larry Doby defeated hate
From Richard Sisk at Military.com on December 25, 2018:
Seaman Lawrence Eugene “Larry” Doby’s first realistic thought that they might give him a chance happened on the remote Pacific atoll of Ulithi, the Navy’s staging base for the invasion of Okinawa during World War II.
A report on Armed Forces Radio announced that the Brooklyn Dodgers were going to sign UCLA football star and former Army lieutenant Jackie Robinson to a contract to play baseball in 1946.
If Robinson proved himself on Brooklyn’s Montreal farm team, if he could withstand the vicious taunts and shunning, he could make history as the first black major leaguer.
Brooklyn’s front office boss, Branch Rickey, believed Robinson would be ready to be called up to the big team in 1947 to break baseball’s unofficial color line, which relegated black ballplayers to the Negro Leagues.
Read the full article here: https://www.military.com/daily-news/2018/12/25/war-and-baseball-navy-seaman-and-gold-medal-honoree-larry-doby-defeated-hate.html
- Related link: Read our biography of Larry Doby at the SABR BioProject
Originally published: December 26, 2018. Last Updated: December 26, 2018.