Jackie Robinson & Pee Wee Reese Monument
New York, Kings County, New York
Marker Inscription
THE JACKIE ROBINSON & PEE WEE REESE MONUMENT DONORS BANK OF AMERICA - BLOOMBERG - BROOKLYN BREWERY - BRYAN CAVE - BOB DALY - FOREST CITY RATNER COMPANIES - THEODORE J. FORESTMANN - JAMES F. GILL - THE HONORABLE RUDOLPH W. GIULIANI - [...]… transcription continues on the marker
This transcription may be incomplete
Our source stores marker text in a field capped at 255 characters, and this inscription appears to have been cut off. We won’t guess at the missing words — the inscription is the primary source, and inventing it would be worse than leaving it short.
Have you stood in front of this marker? Send us the full text or a photo of the sign and we’ll complete the record.
The Story
This monument stands near the Brooklyn ballpark that keeps the borough's Dodgers legacy alive, honoring one of the most powerful moments in American sports. In 1947 Jackie Robinson broke Major League Baseball's color barrier as a Brooklyn Dodger, enduring relentless abuse from crowds and opposing players. The monument depicts his teammate and team captain, Pee Wee Reese, a white Southerner, stepping over to stand beside him in a public gesture of solidarity that came to symbolize acceptance and courage. The bronze captures Reese's arm around Robinson's shoulder — an image of two teammates refusing to be divided.
Why it matters
Robinson's arrival reshaped professional sports and became an early, visible victory in the long struggle for civil rights, while the friendship it memorializes shows how ordinary acts of solidarity can stand against prejudice.
The story behind this marker
AI contextThe era
This monument stands in Brooklyn, near the water at Coney Island, in the shadow of a ballpark that keeps the borough's deep baseball roots alive. Brooklyn and its Dodgers were inseparable for generations — the team was woven into the identity of the place, a source of borough pride and heartbreak in equal measure.
The moment it commemorates belongs to the years just after the Second World War, when returning veterans, a shifting economy, and a rising civil rights movement were beginning to test the country's promises of equality. Professional baseball, the self-styled national pastime, had for decades been rigidly segregated, its Black players confined to separate leagues no matter how brilliant.
Against that backdrop, what happened on a Brooklyn diamond in 1947 was not just a sports story. It was a very public crack in a wall the whole nation had agreed not to look at too closely.
People & events
In 1947, Jackie Robinson took the field for the Brooklyn Dodgers and became the man who broke Major League Baseball's color barrier. He did it under conditions almost impossible to imagine: relentless abuse from opposing players and crowds, threats, and the crushing pressure of knowing that every at-bat was a referendum on whether he belonged. He answered with excellence and with a discipline that cost him enormously.
At his side was Pee Wee Reese, the Dodgers' shortstop and team captain, a white Southerner from Kentucky. The monument depicts the gesture that became legend — Reese stepping over to stand beside Robinson and lay an arm across his shoulder, a wordless declaration that this was his teammate. Historians note that the exact time and place of that moment are debated, and some details may have grown in the retelling; but the friendship and the public solidarity between the two men are well documented.
The inscription itself is a roll of donors — the banks, businesses, and civic figures who paid to raise this bronze. It is a reminder that memory is a civic act: honoring a moment like this takes a community willing to fund it, name itself, and say publicly that it mattered.
Its place in the American story
Robinson's arrival reshaped professional sports, but its meaning ran far past the outfield fence. Here was integration happening in the open, on front pages and radio broadcasts, years before the landmark civil rights victories of the following decades. Millions of Americans who would never march or sit at a lunch counter still watched a Black man succeed at the highest level and endure with dignity.
The image cast in this monument — a white teammate's arm around a Black teammate — endured because it distilled something larger than baseball. It suggested that prejudice could be met not only by protest but by ordinary loyalty, by one person refusing to let another stand alone.
That is why the two men are remembered together. Robinson supplied the courage and the talent to walk through the door; the gesture beside him showed that the door could be held open by people willing to be seen doing it.
If you visit
You will find the monument near the Coney Island ballpark, an easy pairing with a stroll along the boardwalk and beach. Look first at the bronze itself: the two figures, and Reese's arm reaching across Robinson's shoulders. Sculptures usually set their heroes apart and alone — the power here is that these two are together, mid-gesture, caught in an act of choosing each other.
Then read the donor inscription. It is easy to walk past a list of names, but linger a moment: those names are the modern chapter of the story, a city's businesses and citizens deciding this history deserved a permanent place by the sea.
Come, if you can, on a day when the ballpark is busy. The crack of a bat and a crowd nearby is the right soundtrack for remembering a moment that changed what the game — and the country watching it — could be. It fits naturally into a broader Brooklyn day trip, a small, weighty stop between the amusements and the shore.
Written by AI to add context, grounded in the marker’s inscription and the historical record. The inscription above is the original, unaltered text.
Plan your visit
NearbyMake a day of it — museums, food, and places to stay near this marker.
Museums & culture
- The Waterfront Museum7.2 mi away · 290 Conover Street
- Golden Anvil7.2 mi away · 102 Dikeman Street
- Kentler International Drawing Space7.2 mi away
- Realty Collective7.2 mi away
- Canal St Studios7.2 mi away
- Lofty Art Gallery7.2 mi away
Attractions
- Street Car7.1 mi away
- Governor's Island Kayaking8.2 mi away · Pier 101, New York, NY
- Fort Jay8.2 mi away
- Brooklyn Heights Promenade8.4 mi away
- Statue of Liberty8.5 mi away
- Brooklyn Heights Promenade8.5 mi away
Food & drink
- Crown Cafe8.6 mi away · Liberty Island, New York, NY
- Ellis Island Cafe9.0 mi away
- Baozi Brew Dim Zum Restaurant9.7 mi away
- Liberty House Restaurant9.7 mi away
- Maritime Parc9.8 mi away
- Yaso9.9 mi away · 30 Hudson Street, Jersey City, NJ
Places to stay
- Casa Cipriani New York8.8 mi away · 10 South Street, New York, NY
- Hilton Garden Inn9.0 mi away · 6 Water Street, New York, NY
- Hampton9.0 mi away · 32 Pearl Street, New York, NY
- DoubleTree by Hilton9.0 mi away · 8 Stone Street, New York, NY
- The FiDi Hotel9.1 mi away · 11 Stone Street, New York
- Wall Street Inn9.1 mi away · 9 South William Street, New York, NY
Places data © OpenStreetMap contributors. Hours and details change — call ahead.
Own a business near here? Add it to the map.
Related people
- · Jackie Robinson
- · Pee Wee Reese
Related events
- · Integration of Major League Baseball (1947)
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Jackie Robinson
New York, NY
Jackie Robinson lived at this Brooklyn address from 1947 to 1949, the very years he broke Major League Baseball's color barrier as an infielder for the Brooklyn Dodgers. He was named Rookie of the Year in 1947 and Most Valuable Player in 1949, won the National League batting title, and led the Dodgers to the pennant in 1947, 1949, 1952, and 1953.
Jackie Robinson
New York, NY
On April 10, 1947, inside what was then the McAlpin Hotel on Herald Square, Jackie Robinson got the phone call confirming he would join the Brooklyn Dodgers — days before he stepped onto Ebbets Field and broke Major League Baseball's color line. Robinson, a UCLA-educated Army veteran, had spent 1946 proving himself with the Dodgers' farm system while enduring relentless hostility. His debut that spring made him the first Black player in the modern majors, a turning point watched by the whole country. The moment this plaque marks is the quiet hinge before the history: a room, a phone, and a decision that reshaped American sport and society.
Roy Wilkins
New York, NY
Roy Wilkins, one of the most influential civil rights leaders of the 20th century, lived in this Queens home from 1952 until his death in 1981. A journalist and longtime editor of the NAACP's "The Crisis," he served the organization for 46 years, becoming its executive director. A champion of working through constitutional and legislative means, he helped plan the 1963 March on Washington and press for landmark civil rights, voting rights, and fair housing laws.
Marian Anderson
New York, NY
The great contralto Marian Anderson lived here from 1958 to 1975, by then already an American icon. In 1939, after the Daughters of the American Revolution barred her from Constitution Hall because of her race, she sang instead before 75,000 people at the Lincoln Memorial in a landmark moment for civil rights. She was the first African American to perform at the White House in 1936 and the first to become a permanent member of the Metropolitan Opera in 1955, and she later served as an alternate delegate to the United Nations.