Joe Jackson

15 Pages 3759 Words

ily, yet he became a professional baseball player that made it twice to the World Series. Joe had a tough childhood, growing up with almost nothing ("Joe Jackson"). Despite this, he worked his way up the rankings to be one of the greatest baseball players of all time, only to be incriminated for taking money to throw a series games. Due to these allegations against him, many people overlook his greatness. Jackson was banned from baseball as a result of these allegations, disabling him from being inducted into Cooperstown (Kinsella). With all of Jackson's accomplishments, and even though he was banned from baseball, he is one of the hardest working players that ever played the game and should be inducted into the Hall of Fame. Still fifty-one years after his death, he has yet to be acknowledged for his accomplishments.
Joe had a brutal childhood in South Carolina. Due to the fact that his family saw no need for education, Jackson stayed illiterate his whole life (Rielly). Hence, he would sign his name with an "X" on contracts and other important papers. Ever since Joe was six he was in the work force. He worked in the same mill as his parents did, enduring twelve hours of exhausting work overload. This hard work ethic that took place in his childhood readied him for his long and enduring baseball career. To lighten things up at the mill, the owner would offer different incentives to keep his employees happy. One such incentive allowed employees to play baseball on a company sponsored team, thus making workloads easier and permitting extra time off to practice ("Joe Jackson").
When Joe turned thirteen, he was invited to play on the Brandon Mill team. From the start he was a natural, crushing balls with his powerful swing ("Joe Jackson"). He learned his amazing swing from a Confederate veteran, who in turn had learned all of his baseball skills from Union soldiers in a northern prison camp (Ward). The textile workers that came to wat...