about the book
It was an old ticket stub in the bottom of cardboard box of mementos. I remember how excited I had been that day. I was eight, obsessed with the Brooklyn Dodgers and it was the 1948 home game opener. My dad and I spent hours together reading the sports pages and listening to every game on my transistor radio. Dad died a few days ago; December 5, 1959. Mom found the mementos in the back of dad’s closet. Through my grief, my mind flashes back to those happier days.
My name is Steve Satlow, and except for the baseball thing and a problem with being a little impulsive, I was a pretty normal kid. Our family lived in the all-Jewish Flatbush neighborhood in Brooklyn. That was the year rumors spread that a black family was moving into the area. They moved in just two doors down from our place on Tilden Avenue!
Rather than being upset like most of our neighbors, we were ecstatic. It was Jackie Robinson, my idol. He broke the color barrier in professional baseball. The Dodgers made it all the way to the World Series the year before and Jackie was a big part of why the Dodgers won the National League pennant. I wanted to run right over there the minute they arrived. I remember my dad made me wait.
When I knock on his door, the quiet man invites me into his home. It is the beginning of a life-long close friendship, not only between Jackie and me, but also between Archie and Sarah, my parents, and Jackie and his wife Rachel. But it wasn’t all good times. During the years that followed, Jackie and my dad taught me a lot about self-esteem, bigotry, tolerance, respect, conflict resolution, and justice. People tried to force the Robinson’s out…but in the end, having them there helped change the whole neighborhood into the richly diverse community it is today.
This is my story. In it, you’ll learn a lot of lessons…about determination, about living through bad times, about baseball, and even about sharing a Christmas tree on Hanukkah! It’s all true.
about the author
Though Sharon Robinson grew up in the public eye, until she was six she didn’t know that her father was famous. Jackie Robinson broke the professional baseball color barrier in 1947, putting his whole family under public scrutiny. By the time she was born (1950), the worst of the controversy was over and Jack Roosevelt Robinson had proved himself a star athlete. Sharon was middle sister to Jackie Jr. and David, and her mom, Rachel, was a nurse.
They grew up in white neighborhoods and their childhoods were filled with typical activities. It was during a summer camp movie that Sharon made her big discovery. The movie was about her father’s life, and she remembers “I think I knew even then that something inside me had changed, and just as my father had changed the larger world, my own little world would never look quite the same again.”
While in junior high, she and her family participated in the March on Washington and heard Dr. Martin Luther King’s famous “I Have a Dream” speech. After the march, the Robinsons hosted a fund-raising party and Dr. King attended. During her freshman year, schools were integrated and she was bussed across town. She enjoyed the school and got involved in sports. Jackie supported her swimming, skating, skiing, and basketball endeavors. He taught her to care about people, to believe in social change, and to speak out.
After earning degrees from Howard University and Columbia, and a post-Master’s Certificate in Teaching from the University of Pennsylvania, Sharon had a 20-year career as a nurse-midwife and educator. In 1989, she began participating in the Major League Baseball’s educational programs. Currently she manages Breaking Barriers: In Sports, In Life, which empowers students to face obstacles in their lives. Since 1997, it has reached over 22 million students. Sharon is also involved in the Jackie Robinson Foundation and is the author of several books.
Long after the Robinson family moved out of the Flatbush neighborhood, they remained close lifelong friends with the Satlows. Jackie gave Steve a baseball signed by all of the 1955 World Champion Dodgers. A dream come true!
Sharon is married to Molver Fieffe, an engineer from Haiti, and she has one son Jesse Martin Robinson Simms. She lives in Sarasota, Florida, and New York City.
Sources:
Author website
Author biography: Encyclopedia.com
The Hero Two Doors Down book discussion: Scholastic
Book trailer: The Hero Two Doors Down
Also by Sharon Robinson:
Testing the Ice : A True Story about Jackie Robinson. Scholastic. 2009.
Promises to Keep : How Jackie Robinson Changed America. Scholastic. 2004.
read more!
Dad, Jackie, and Me by Myron Uhlberg
In Brooklyn, New York, in 1947, a boy is thrilled when Jackie Robinson joins his favorite team, the Dodgers. The boy is very surprised when his deaf father shows an interest in Jackie and even gets tickets to games. Cheering on the first baseman, the boy learns about discrimination and tolerance as he realizes how his father also had to cope in an intolerant world.
In the Year of the Boar and Jackie Robinson by Bette Bao Lord
In 1947, young Shirley Temple Wong arrives in Brooklyn, New York, to begin a new life with her family. Knowing no English, it is hard for Shirley to fit in at first—but when she discovers radio, and then baseball, and finally the spectacle of the hero Jackie Robinson—first African American in the MLB—Shirley finds courage to make new friends.
Testing the Ice : A True Story about Jackie Robinson by Sharon Robinson
After Sharon and her family move to a lakeside home, they quickly make friends with the neighborhood kids, often playing by the lake. Sharon sees that her father never sets foot in the water. When winter comes, he bravely tests the ice before they play on the frozen lake and, realizing he can’t swim, Sharon is overwhelmed by his courage.