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Today, if you didn’t know, is Jackie Robinson Day.  In 1947, Jackie Robinson re-broke the color line into major league baseball.  That’s right, re-broke.  After the Civil War, during the reconstruction period, African Americans and whites played on the same field.  But as more and more teams began to exclude black players from their teams, the league became exclusively a white sport.  By 1890 the league was completely white.  The baseball field reflected what was going on in towns all across America.  Not only were baseball fields becoming exclusively white, but stores, jobs, housing, and even whole towns were as well.  Jackie Robinson - in 1947 - shows a glimpse of the progression towards equality after decades of regression in the United States.