Jackie Robinson on PBS

[weezie]

I'm sure some of us watched part one last night but if you forgot, set your tivos. It's sure to repeat. Very strong, even in spite of it being the same formula that Burns always uses. The music was directed by Wynton Marsalis and it's perfect.

It's not exactly easy to watch but it's terrific.

[captmojo]

I'm sure some of us watched part one last night but if you forgot, set your tivos. It's sure to repeat. Very strong, even in spite of it being the same formula that Burns always uses. The music was directed by Wynton Marsalis and it's perfect.

It's not exactly easy to watch but it's terrific.

I didn't notice Burns' use of the usual 'Chapter Boards'.

Loved the Cab Calloway video at the end.

[Olympic Fan]

Just finished watching the second part (I DVR'd it).

As usual for Burns, very well done. I thought he did a very good of putting some of Jackie's more controversial political positions into context (especially his support for Nixon in 1960). I knew that Kennedy's decision to try and help Martin Luher King just before the election -- and Nixon's refusal to get involved -- was a key to that election. I didn't know of Jackie's role in trying to persuade Nixon to intervene -- and his disillusionment when he refused.

But two observations:

-- Seeing the segment about Robinson's testimony to the HUAC about Paul Robeson reminded me of the importance of timing in history. Why wasn't Robeson, who found fame in sports and entertainment two decades before Jackie - and was every bit the outspoken civil rights leader -- the racial trailblazer and symbol that Robinson became? The answer can only be timing. Not to diminish what he did, but in the years after WWII, SOMEBODY was going to break the color barrier in baseball. Now, maybe that somebody would not have carried himself as well as Jackie or been strong enough to survive what Robinson had to go through, but still ... it could have been Sam Jethroe or Monte Irvin or Ray Dandridge just as easily as Robinson. He was the right man in the right place at the right time. Robeson (one my heroes -- even if he was eventually seduced by commie propaganda; a two-time first-team football All-American, a Phil Beta Kappa and one of the great voices of his generation ... Jerome Kern wrote Ol' Man River for him) was the right man at the wrong time.

-- Burns states at one point that Robinson's success killed the Negro League. That's not really true. Two men killed the Negro League -- Branch Rickey and William Branham. Branham lived in Durham NC, and was the longtime president of the National Association of Baseball -- the umbrella organization for what was known as organized baseball. In that era, when major league teams brought up players from the minors, they paid the teams for those players -- that's how the minor league teams stayed in business (it was a pyramid scheme -- the lower minors would sell players to the mid-minors and they would eventually sell players to the high minors, thence to the majors). When Rickey signed Robinson to a Montreal (Triple A) contract, Robinson was playing for the Kansas City Monarchs. Rickey refused to compensate the Monarchs. When the Monarchs appealed to Branham, he said the team had no rights because it was not in organized baseball. The Negro League teams then applied for membership in the National Association -- but Branham refused to admit them. The Negro Leagues could -- and should -- have survived for years as a minor league feeder to develop black ballplayers and sell them to the majors. Instead, owners like Rickey and Bill Veeck and Horace Stoeham jumped in and signed whoever they wanted and gave the teams that had developed them nothing. That's what killed the Negro League, not Jackie Robinson.

Branch Rickey gets (and deserves) a lot of credit for his role in breaking the color line. But he was also a cheap SOB who helped kill the Negro Leagues.

[WV_Iron_Duke]

Olympic Fan,
Thanks so much for your insights into the background of part II. I watched it to see the baseball part that occupied the first 45 minutes. This was the 1st time I had ever seen his stealing home in the World Series on film and the still pictures of this moment looked cleaned up for HD. Wasn't particularly interested in his life after baseball but as I watched the 2nd half I thought "Ken Burns is really getting good at this stuff". Part II - Entertaining and highly recommended.