On 9 April 1947 the Brooklyn Dodgers became the first modern team in Major League Baseball to employ a black man as a player. When Branch Rickey hired Jackie Robinson, it was trumpeted as a major breakthrough in the integration of the "separate but equal" world of sports and as a signal that all of America was ready to move toward integration. Jackie Robinson would become a hero for black Americans even more important than Jesse Owens or Joe Louis. The National League teams seemed to see the direct impact of signing black stars. Roy Campanella won the 1951 NL MVP and a black won the MVP award every other year in the decade except 1952: Campanella won two more (1953 and 1955), Willie Mays won in 1954, Don Newcombe in 1955, Hank Aaron in 1957, and Ernie Banks won in 1958 and 1959.
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