1947 - The year Branch Rickey changed America

QUOTE from Ronald Reagan: "It's true hard work never killed anybody, but I figure, why take the chance."

What I LEARNED about Branch Rickey.
 It was 64 years ago this week that America took a step forward in our struggles with race relations. In April of 1947 the U.S. had its first black major league player. It happened because of a man named Branch Rickey.

Branch Rickey was born in Ohio in 1881 and died in 1965. He went to college at Ohio Wesleyan University and was the catcher on the baseball team. He made it to the major leagues with the St. Louis Browns as a catcher in 1905 and 1906. In 1907 he palyed for the New York Highlanders. His major league career was not good - hitting below .200 and he set a major league record when one team stole 13 bases on him in one game. (Kind of sounds like my catching career for Chatfield High School from 1956 - 1958.) So he is not known for his playing career, he is known for something much more important.

After doing some college coaching he returned to the major leagues in 1913 as a front office executive with the Browns, became manager in 1914-1915, went in the U.S. Army and served in France during WWI. Aftet the war he left the Browns and became manager of the St. Louis Cardinals until he was fired in 1925. He then became General Manager of the Cardinals until 1942.

As General Manager he changed major league baseball. He invented the farm system. in the late 1920s. Through that Cardinal farm system came such players as Pepper Martin, Dizzy Dean, and his brother, Paul "Daffy" Dean, Joe Medwick, and a few years later Enos Slaughter, Stan Musial, Marty Marion, and even manager Billy Southworth. Similar farm systems were adopted by every other major league team.

In 1942 Rickey left the Cardinals after two decades to become President and General Manager of the Brooklyn Dodgers. He got the job because Larry MacPhail was a good friend and MacPhail enlisted in the army to serve in WWII.

Branch continued as an innovator in his time with Brooklyn. He was responsible for the first full time training facility, in Vero Beach, Florida, and encouraged the use of now-commonplace tools such as the batting cage, pitching machines, and batting helmets. He aslo promoted the idea that on-base percentage was a more important hitting statistic than batting average.

My next post will be on Rickey's most famous contribution to major league baseball and to the United States - THE BREAKING OF THE COLOR BARRIER.

HUMOR for today: You might be a Minne-SOO-tan if.....
1. Weather is 80% of your conversation.
2. Down south to you means Iowa.
3. You hate the movie "Fargo" but realize that a lot of your family has that accent.
4. You have tried boiled fish in lye at Christmas.
5. Nothing gets you madder than seeing a Green Bay football sticker on a Minnesota car.