Jack “Jackie” Roosevelt Robinson was the youngest of five children, born January 31st, 1919 in the town of Cairo, Georgia. 

Jackie had 3 older brothers named Edgar, Frank, Matthew (otherwise know as “Mack”), and 1 older sister named Willa Mae. 

In 1920, Jackie’s father Jerry Robinson would walk out on his family and never return. As a result, Jackie’s family would move to the town of Pasadena, California.

Without a father in Jackie’s life, his mother Mallie would struggle to work various jobs to support their family. Meanwhile, Jackie and his siblings would not be included in many different recreational activities with other kids in the neighborhood because they were a different skin color. 

Upon graduating from Junior High School, Jackie would enroll at John Muir High School where he would discover his love for sports.

Jackie would go on to play football, basketball, track, tennis, and baseball. Where he won the junior boys singles championship in the Pacific Coast Negro Tennis Tournament, and earned a position on the Pomona annual baseball tournament all-star team. 

Once Jackie graduated from John Muir High School, he attended Pasadena Junior College, where he would continue to play football, basketball, track, and baseball.

While at Pasadena Junior College, Jackie had an altercation with authorities for vocally disputing the racist arrest of one of his black friends. Little did Jackie know, racism would follow him for a long time.

Jackie would then leave Pasadena Junior College to attend UCLA (University of California at Los Angeles). He was one of only four black men on the football team, and would go on to become the first person ever to receive varsity letters for basketball, football, track, and baseball. 

UCLA would be where Jackie would meet his future wife, Rachel Isum. Jackie would then go on to drop out of UCLA just months before graduation, to pursue a job as an assistant athletic director for a youth sports organization.

Just as Jackie’s job had begun to settle in, the attack on Pearl Harbor had occurred. Jackie was then drafted into the military’s Segregated Army Cavalry Unit in Fort Riley, Kansas. 

Once Jackie Robinson’s military career had ended, he had taken a job as an athletic director at Samuel Huston College. 

While working at his job at Samuel Huston, Jackie received a letter with a contract to play professional baseball for the Kansas City Monarchs of the Negro Leagues. Which he would go on to accept.

While playing with the Monarchs, Jackie would perform well, hitting .387 with 5 home runs, and 13 stolen bases. But the hectic travel schedule was placing a strain on his family because they could only communicate by letter.

With the hectic schedule causing a burden on his family, Jackie had begun to try out potential Major League baseball teams, even though a black man had never played for a Major League Team.

At each tryout, Jackie had become subject to racial slurs, and was humiliated at each tryout by every team, except the Brooklyn Dodgers.