Posted on 04/08/2012 3:13:43 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
The year before Jackie Robinson broke the colour barrier by becoming the first African American to play major league baseball, he fled the racist threats of townspeople in Sanford, Florida, where Trayvon Martin was shot 66 years later.
It was 1946 and Robinson arrived in this picturesque town in central Florida for spring training with a Brooklyn Dodgers farm team. He didn’t stay long.
Robinson was forced to leave Sanford twice, according to Chris Lamb, a professor at the College of Charleston in South Carolina, who wrote a graphic account of Robinson’s brush with 100 angry locals in a 2004 book.
The house where Robinson slept during his brief and furtive stay in Sanford still stands, but there is no historical plaque to record his troubled visit before going on to become a baseball hero and an icon of the US civil rights movement.
“A specter of Jackie Robinson” haunts the city of 53,000 people to this day, said Lamb. “People want to forget it and it shouldn’t be forgotten.”
While those days of segregation are now relegated to history, racial tension persists in Sanford, rekindled of late by the Feb. 26 shooting death of an unarmed black teenager, Trayvon Martin, at the hands of a white Hispanic neighbourhood watch volunteer, George Zimmerman.
Calls for “Justice for Trayvon” have grown after prosecutors declined to charge Zimmerman, who says he acted in self-defence. Protesters, led by prominent black civil rights activists, have demanded that Zimmerman be arrested.
“We’ve come from the plantation, from the outhouse to the White House. You can’t shoot our children no more,” the Rev. Al Sharpton told one recent protest rally in Miami....
(Excerpt) Read more at gulf-times.com ...
Must be a slow day down at the Gulf Times of Qatar and Rotor Reuters.
Are they implying Sanford is a racist town?
Sorry Al old boy. You're dreaming again. You've never left the plantation. Think about it the next time you find yourself in a thoughful mood.
In 1946, the KKK was active in Massachusetts, for cripes sake.
It’s just like 1861 all over again!
Yeah, those sorts of bigotry and violence happened a lot in those days. The problem with bringing it up now is that to have meaningfully participated a Sanford resident would have to be eighty or older now. It is only relevant to the aggrieved and resentful seeking retribution. Pretty good description of Rev. Al?
Sharpton, Robinson, Lamb, and Martin are all not from Sanford, FL.
Interesting how the media can come up with something from 1946 but can’t seem to find any school records for the current occupant of the White House.
Very strange indeed. Especially the “media” in Qatar of all places. Lots of Jackie Robinson fans in Qatar I guess.
Who can't Al, who is the “you” you are talking about. And what do you mean “no more”. Who was and is shooting your children and who can do it “no more”.
http://www.jimcrowhistory.org/resources/lessonplans/hs_es_jackie_robinson.htm
I love Jackie Robinson, as a player and as a man. Nice story. He really had class, well deserved self-respect and so much talent. It's almost a sacrilege to see hucksters like Sharpton and Jesse Jackson trying to ride his coat tails.
“white Hispanic”
Nothing but race baiting by a racist.
Well, the word is that there will be an announcement at a press conference by the Sanford PD this coming Tuesday that there will be no arrest in connection with this case because there is no evidence there was a crime committed. However, there is evidence that this was a case of self-defense.
Pffft! What about New York’s violent racist past?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_York_City_draft_riots
http://www.press.uchicago.edu/Misc/Chicago/317749.html
And talk about secessionists, let’s talk about those eco, globalist, anti-capitalist Republic of Cascadia Secession Movmenet.
http://attackthesystem.com/2012/04/03/republic-of-cascadia-secessionist-movement/
http://zapatopi.net/cascadia/
Or the State of Jefferson but that pretty much went belly-up with the start of WorldWar2
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jefferson_%28Pacific_state%29
http://bigthink.com/ideas/21511
I’m tired of only the South being targeted and sullied by this racist, secessionist mess. As if that crud didn’t happen any other place.
Al, you are an ass.
Trayvon Martin Case: George Zimmerman not being charged
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/2869453/posts
In 1946, Robert Byrd was probably Grand Potentate.
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