Randy Jackson obit

Ransom Jackson, hit last home run for Brooklyn Dodgers, dies at 93

 

He was not on the list. 

Ransom Joseph ‘Randy’ Jackson Jr., an all-star third baseman with the Chicago Cubs in the mid-1950s and the last Brooklyn Dodger to hit a home run, died at home in Athens Wednesday after a brief illness, according to a family friend. He was 93 years old.

Nicknamed “Handsome Ransom,” Jackson played for the Cubs from 1950-55 and in 1959. He also spent two-plus years with the Dodgers in Brooklyn and Los Angeles and parts of 1958 and 1959 with the Cleveland Indians. Over 10 big-league seasons, the third baseman batted .261 with 103 home runs. He was the oldest living Los Angeles Dodger at the time of his death.

Jackson was selected to the National League All-Star team in 1954 and 1955 but his best year was 1953 when he hit .285 with 19 home runs.

Injuries limited Jackson to 48 games in 1957, the Dodgers last year in Brooklyn. In the next-to-last game at the Philadelphia Phillies, he hit his second home run of the season and the last by a Brooklyn player. The Dodgers relocated to Los Angeles in 1958.

Jackson didn’t know it was an historic homer until some 30 years later when his son, Chuck, called to tell him he was the subject of a trivia question on the television show Good Morning America. In his autobiography, Accidental Big League, co-authored with Gaylon White, he related the story. “They asked, ‘Who was the last Brooklyn Dodger to hit a home run,” Chuck said. “Dad, the answer was you!”

As a collegiate football player, he is the only player to appear in back-to-back Cotton Bowls for different schools, the first in 1945 for Texas Christian University and the second in 1946 for the University of Texas.

As a National League All-Star, he shared the field with such baseball greats as Stan Musial, Henry Aaron, Willie Mays, Ted Williams, Mickey Mantle, Yogi Berra and Mickey Mantle. With the Dodgers he played alongside Robinson, Duke Snider, Roy Campanella, Pee Wee Reese, Gil Hodges, Carl Furillo, Don Newcombe, Carl Erskine, Sandy Koufax and Don Drysdale.

In Jackson’s final at bat for the Cubs in 1959, he pinch-hit for Billy Williams, a 21-year-old rookie who went on to hit 426 homers in a Hall of Fame career.

His hitting and excellent play at third earned him consecutive trips to the All-Star Game in his last two seasons in Chicago. In the 1954 game he came off the bench behind starter Ray Jablonski of the St. Louis Cardinals, in an 11–9 loss to the American League (AL). The next season, 1955, he again came off the bench, in a 6–5 win for the National League, behind the Milwaukee Braves' Eddie Mathews.

On the strength of Jackson's five continuous seasons in Chicago, the Dodgers, looking for a replacement for their aging All-Star third baseman Jackie Robinson, traded Don Hoak, Russ Meyer and Walt Moryn to the Cubs for Jackson and Don Elston.

Jackson played off the bench behind Robinson in 1956. Despite having over 200 fewer plate appearances than in his previous year, he managed a .274 average with 8 home runs and 53 RBI. The Dodgers played in the famed "subway Series" against their hated cross-town rivals, the New York Yankees in the 1956 World Series, but Jackson had only three pinch-hit at-bats, going 0-for-3, with two strike-outs.

Jackson was born Feb. 10, 1926, in Little Rock, Arkansas.

He moved his family to Athens, Georgia, in 1956 and on leaving baseball in 1959, went into the life insurance business. In 1972, he met and married his wife of 47 years, Terry Yeargan.

Jackson is survived by wife Terry; and their six children and spouses – Randy and wife, Laurie; Chuck and wife, Anna; Ann and husband, Clay, Ginny and husband, Bill; Meredith and husband, Kenny; Ransom and wife, Lara; 13 grandchildren and eight great grandchildren.

A memorial service will be held 11 a.m. Saturday, March 30, at Chapelwood United Methodist Church, 100 Janice Drive in Athens.

Memorial donations may be directed to the Boys and Girls Club of Athens and the Chapelwood United Methodist Church choir.

Notable games

    28 June 1951: Hits a home run in the seventh inning to help the Cubs Frank Hiller to a "one-hitter", winning 8–0 over the St. Louis Cardinals, facing just 27 batters.

    15 August 1953: Tied a NL record by grounding into three double-plays against the Milwaukee Braves in a 2–0 loss (Joe Torre would later break the record).

    17 April 1954: With the wind at his back, he had four hits, including a home run which hit an apartment building on Waveland Avenue, across from Wrigley Field, in a NL record three-hour and 43-minute game against the St. Louis Cardinals. The Cubs won the game 23–13, the highest scoring game ever between these two rivals, and the two teams combine for 35 hits, including five homers and a 10-run Chicago 5th inning, with Jim Brosnan the winning pitcher over Gerry Staley.

    28 September 1957: Hit the final home run in Brooklyn Dodgers history before the team moved to Los Angeles for the 1958 season in an 8-4 victory over the Phillies.

    Another unusual game occurred on June 29, 1956, where he was playing for the Brooklyn Dodgers against the Philadelphia Phillies, who were leading 5-2 going into the bottom of the ninth inning. Pee Wee Reese was on second base when Duke Snider preceded Jackson with a home run which brought the game to 5-4. Jackson then hit a home run to tie the game, and on the next pitch Gil Hodges hit another home run to win the game for the Dodgers, being the only time in Major League Baseball history where a baseball game ended with three consecutive home runs.