Smallman Street Rampages

life:

When Jack Roosevelt Robinson stepped onto Brooklyn’s Ebbets Field on April 15, 1947, he not only changed the face of professional baseball in America. In ways subtle and profound — ways that have been debated, dissected and celebrated in books, films, popular songs, academic circles and casual conversations in the long decades since — he changed the nation itself. Breaking baseball’s color barrier, Robinson embarked on an odyssey that brought him renown, respect and, by all accounts, an early death, at 53, from the stress he suffered, on and off the ball field, as the first black player in the major leagues.
Here, we look back at classic and rare LIFE photos of the American Icon.

When Jack Roosevelt Robinson stepped onto Brooklyn’s Ebbets Field on April 15, 1947, he not only changed the face of professional baseball in America. In ways subtle and profound — ways that have been debated, dissected and celebrated in books, films, popular songs, academic circles and casual conversations in the long decades since — he changed the nation itself. Breaking baseball’s color barrier, Robinson embarked on an odyssey that brought him renown, respect and, by all accounts, an early death, at 53, from the stress he suffered, on and off the ball field, as the first black player in the major leagues.

Here, we look back at classic and rare LIFE photos of the American Icon.