This lot is closed. Bidding ended on 5/11/2001.
As the first black man to be allowed to play in the big leagues, Jackie Robinson had to endure more pressure than the average man could take. Yet despite many racial animosities on the field, so many fans took to him that he always seemed to have time for an act of generosity in return. In November 1951, after his fifth season with the Brooklyn Dodgers, a man wrote to Robinson asking him to sign a ball for a sick child in the hospital. Jackie was out of town at the time, and his secretary sent back a letter directing that the ball be sent the ball to the Dodgers. But when Jackie got home, he personally wrote the man and told him to send the ball to Robinson's own home address, and even invited him to pick the ball up there. Robinson thereafter signed this ONL Frick ball by writing, "To Arthur Abrahamson, best wishes, Sincerely, Jackie Robinson." The ball is lightly toned, with Robinson's inscription on a side panel in blue pen. The signature rates a 6. Robinson's letter of December 20, 1951 is on his own personalized stationery and it also has his signature in blue pen, rating a 7. Included as well is the letter from Robinson's secretary, who signed his name to it, and a photograph of the boy in his hospital bed to whom the ball was sent.