Read The Era, 1947-1957: When the Yankees, the Giants, and the Dodgers Ruled the World for Free Online Page B

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    In Panama the Dodgers were billeted briefly in an army barracks at Fort Gulick. There Clyde Sukeforth, called Sukey, a Maine man, went to Durocher with disturbing news. Sukeforth had been the primary scout assigned to watch Robinson in the Negro American League. Now, Sukey told Durocher, he had found out about a petition. A simple petition, really. The signers swore that they would never play on the same team as Jackie Robinson.
    Fred “Dixie” Walker, the right fielder who was so popular that Manhattan sportswriters, making fun of Brooklyn speech, called him “the Pee-pul’s Cherce,” prepared the document. A native of Villa Rica, Georgia, who lived in Birmingham, Walker recently had led the National League in batting. Now thirty-six years old, he was the leader of the team. Walker did not glower in solitude. Hugh Casey of Atlanta, the best relief pitcher in baseball, supported the petition. So did a character named Bobby Bragan, from Birmingham, a third-string catcher but an influence because of his loud and caustic manner.
    Confederates started the petition. Union forces did not lack for representation. Harry “Cookie” Lavagetto, the third baseman from Oakland who was almost as popular in Brooklyn as Dixie Walker, hurried to sign. Others who also signed included the kid center fielder Carl Furillo of Reading, Pennsylvania, and a fine second baseman out of Philadelphia, Eddie Stanky.
    Harold “Pee Wee” Reese, of Louisville, underwent a crisis. He had grown up in a segregated community. Indeed, he remembered his father, a detective for the Louisville and Nashville Railroad, taking him to a tree with strong, low branches. “This is the hanging tree,” the father said. “When a nigger gets out of line, we hang him here.”
    In a quiet, non-evangelical way, Pee Wee Reese was a Christian. Now, he wondered, as a Christian, how could he deny Robinson the right to inherit a small portion of the earth? He could not and he would not. Reese was not comfortable opening his heart to Dixie Walker. Instead he said, “Look, Dix. This thing might rebound. I can’t take the chance of signing it. I just got out of the navy. I got no money. I have a wife and baby to support. Skip me, Dixie.”*
    Although a few other Dodgers declined to sign, Reese’s statement was as close as any ballplayer came to challenging the preeminent establishment racists, Walker † and Casey.
    Leo Durocher was approaching what was probably the finest hour of his life. He could not sleep on the cot in the barracks at Fort Gulick in the Canal Zone. At one o’clock in the morning, Durocher decided that there was no reason why he should sleep. No reason at all. The petition was going to rip apart the ballclub.
Get the hell up!
In pajamas, Durocher roused his coaches and told them to bring all the players into a big empty kitchen behind an army mess.
    The team assembled in night clothing and underwear. “Boys,” Durocher began, in the raspy, brassy voice that rattled spinal disks. “I hear some of you don’t want to play with Robinson. Some of you have drawn up a petition.”
    The players sat on chopping blocks. They leaned against stoves.
    “Well, boys, you know what you can use that petition for.
    “Yeah, you know.
    “You’re not that fucking dumb.
    “Take the petition and, you know, wipe your ass.”
    The Brooklyn Dodgers suddenly were awake.
    “I’m the manager and I’m paid to win and I’d play an elephant if he could win for me and this fellow Robinson is no elephant. You can’t throw him out on the bases and you can’t get him out at the plate. This fellow is a great player. He’s gonna win pennants. He’s gonna put money in your pockets and mine.
    “And here’s something else. He’s only the first, boys, only the first! There’s many more colored ballplayers coming right behind him and they’re hungry, boys. They’re scratching and diving.
    “Unless you wake up, these colored ballplayers are gonna run you right