Branch Rickey was a rare man who decided to break the color barrier in baseball. He hand-picked Jackie Robinson for the job and made him promise that he would never fight back on the field. 60 years ago today, Robinson took the field for the first time in a Brooklyn Dodger uniform and the world changed.

(Branch Rickey signing Jackie Robinson for the Brooklyn Dodgers)

In the realm of baseball, George Will can certainly say it better than I, and he does today in the Washington Post:

"Robinson," writes Eig, "showed black Americans what was possible. He showed white Americans what was inevitable." By the end of the 1947 season, America's future was unfolding by democracy's dialectic of improvement. Robinson changed sensibilities, which led to changed laws, which in turn accelerated changes in sensibilities.

Number 42 is retired by Major League Baseball, though some players will be wearing it today to honor Mr. Robinson, a trned started by Ken Griffey Jr. On this day, however, I also think of Branch Rickey. He was ahead of his time. He knew somene would break the barrier and it might as well be him. It would make the Dodgers better, no doubt, but it had to more than that.

They were great men.

Rickey's obituary quoted Jackie Robinson:

Jackie Robinson, who was signed by Mr. Rickey to break baseball's barrier against Negro players, said "the passing of Mr. Rickey is like losing a father." He said his death was "a great loss not only to baseball but to America."

If he was a father to Robinson then he was a demanding one, setting his "son" loose to be insulted and threatened. But Robinson was up to the task, proving on the field his detractors wrong and his "father" correct.