What I Learned from Jackie Robinson A Teammate's Reflections on and Off the Field

This is an intimate look at Jackie Robinson's fight for equality, from former teammate and longtime friend Carl Erskine. "Jackie needed to quell his anger the first couple of years, a task which only someone of this inner strength and vision could have coped with at that moment. When I reflect and wonder what it must have been like for a man who should have been at the happiest of moments in his life, to still have to deal with racial indignities on a daily basis, it is mind-boggling. Most mortal men would have cracked." - Carl Erskine, from the book. Jackie Robinson changed the game of baseball forever when he paved the way for equality in sports. In "What I Learned from Jackie Robinson", former teammate and friend, Carl Erskine shares his memories of Jackie's crusade in a loving social memoir. Written with "New York Times" bestselling coauthor, Burton Rocks and filled with personal photos, this moving portrait of friendship takes readers for the first time inside the locker room, inside the soul of Jackie, and inside the hearts of his friends, teammates, and oppressors.;As a former Dodger, with access to the important people from Jackie's life, Erskine talks with Robinson's widow and also shares memories about: Yogi Berra, Whitey Ford, Sandy Koufax, Stan Musial, Pee Wee Reese, Roy Campanella, Don Drysdale, Billy Martin and many other players, coaches, sportswriters, and entertainers who remembered Jackie on and off the field. A retrospective on a man who fought for his cause until death, this memoir is a testament to the man and the game that brought the world together when it was falling apart.