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Fifty years ago little black boys all over America learned about baseball, Major League Baseball (MLB) and how it came that before Jackie Robinson, there were no black men in MLB; no black men were allowed to play in the major leagues before Jackie Robinson. I was one of those boys, I grew up in Kentucky, I was not allowed to play little league baseball. We made our own league of two teams with interchangeable players. We emulated the stars of the major leagues, some by position, regardless of their race. All of us loved the Brooklyn Dodgers because Jackie Robinson played for them. A most prized possession was a replica Dodgers uniform, hard to come by but loved by all. I think the reason the color blue has been my favorite for all these years is because Dodgers uniforms were that color, “Dodger blue”.

Recently I had the privilege of making the acquaintance of Sharon Robinson, the daughter of Jackie Robinson. She visited the Florence Williams Public Library during National Library Week @ Your Library activities and expressed interest in coming back and reading at the library Story Hour…Reading Time @ Your Library. Saturday May 18 she did just that and more.

Sharon is author of the book Jackie’s Nine: Jackie Robinson’s Values to Live By, 2001, Scholastic, New York. In Jackie’s Nine, Sharon explores and shares with the reader, the nine values that help make it possible for her father to accomplish what he did as a great athlete/baseball player and American hero. On Saturday she read from her book for the children, their parents and others in attendance. As the Vice-President of Major League Baseball, Sharon, earlier in the week (Tuesday May 15) was in California at the Culver City Julian Dixon Library where MLB and the American Library Association (ALA) launched the program to promote The Campaign for America’s Libraries “Major Leagues@Your Library. Culver City is part of the County of Los Angles Public Library and Dodgers Stadium. "The program is designed to promote the role of libraries and librarians in helping people of all ages develop 21^st century information literacy skills" says John W. Berry, President of the American Library Association. (Official Rules for "Join the Major Leagues@At Your Library").

The Story Hour…Reading Time @ Your Library presented an opportunity for other library visitors, partners and Friends, to meet Sharon, participate in the project and share. Dr. Marlon Williams, the Vice-President of the Virgin Islands Olympic Committee and founder of the Boys to Men, Girls to Women Foundation for youth, was there and shared his thoughts on the developments in sports related to the Olympics and encouraged all to support that effort. Edgar Lake, library resident poet, humanist, playwright, scholar, had the occasion to read a poem he wrote about Jackie Robinson entitled "The Lift". He read from his play, "The Stone Circle," which cited Alphonso "Piggy Gerard", who was among several other Negro Baseball League players considered for the major leagues. He shared with those present a negro baseball poster from his collection. Ingrid Bough-Bell of the Library of Congress and a native Virgin Islander, was in attendance and shared with the group her reasons for visiting St.Croix. She related to the Jackie Robinson on-line collection in the Library of Congress), its contents and how to access it .

As director of educational programming for MLB, Sharon devoted a number of years to creating, developing and managing MLB's national character education initiative, Breaking Barriers: In Sports, In Life, a program designed to empower students with strategies to help them deal with the challenges they face, day in and day out. A former nurse-midwife and educator who has taught at such prestigious universities as Yale, Columbia and Georgetown, Sharon has created an entire curriculum that allows teachers to apply baseball concepts to the academics and social skills they teach. "It gives us a chance to show that learning can be fun and not torturous", says Sharon. "If we can get them to enjoy what they're doing, then they will want to learn." [from First Person Book Page interview by Heidi Henneman] Her Breaking Barriers program has reached over a million children across the U.S. and Canada and has now extended its reach to the Caribbean.

It was a fitting occasion to have Sharon Robinson at the library, the setting provided an excellent opportunity for all in attendance to receive her message; the adult participants used the occasion to exchange thoughts and ideas related to literacy and human development.