I Never Had It Made

I Never Had It Made Jackie Robinson, as told to Alfred Duckett (The Ecco Press, $24) His grandfather was a slave, his father a dirt-poor sharecropper. He integrated the majors in 1947, a heroic precursor of the civil rights movement. The Brooklyn Dodgers almost petitioned management to keep him off the team, the St. Louis Cardinals threatened a walkout, and the Phillies taunted him with racial slurs. The crowd hurled insults from the stands. The mail brought death threats. Hotels refused to rent him rooms, restaurants to serve him. Who says the '40s and the '50s were the golden age of baseball? If they were, it's because Jackie Robinson silenced the bigots with his courage, dignity, home runs, RBIs, and stolen bases. This new edition of his memoir adds updates from Hank Aaron and Cornel West. An American classic. A -Suzanne Ruta