Editing Shoeless Joe Jackson (section)

==Early life==
[[File:1907 Victor Mills baseball team.jpg|thumb|left|250px|Jackson (middle row, second from left) with the 1907 Victor Mills team]]

Jackson was born in [[Pickens County, South Carolina]], the oldest son of George Jackson, a [[Sharecropping|sharecropper]]. While Jackson was still a baby, his father moved the family to [[Pelzer, South Carolina]].<ref name="mainbooksource">{{cite book |title=Shoeless: The Life and Times of Joe Jackson |author=David L. Fleitz|publisher=McFarland|isbn=978-0-7864-3312-4|page=6|date=November 14, 2007}}</ref> A few years later, the family moved to a [[company town]] called [[Brandon Mill]] on the outskirts of [[Greenville, South Carolina]].<ref name="Fleitz p. 7">Fleitz p. 7</ref> An attack of [[measles]] almost killed him when he was 10. He was bedridden for two months and paralyzed while he was nursed back to health by his mother.<ref name="Fleitz p. 9">Fleitz p. 9</ref>

Starting at the age of 6 or 7, Jackson worked in one of the town's textile mills as a "linthead", a derogatory name for a mill hand.<ref name="Fleitz p. 7"/> Family finances required Jackson to take 12-hour shifts in the mill, and since education at the time was a luxury the Jackson family couldn't afford, Jackson was functionally illiterate.<ref name="Fleitz p. 7"/> His lack of education ultimately became an issue throughout Jackson's life. It even affected the value of his memorabilia in the collectibles market; because Jackson was illiterate, he often had his wife forge his signature. Consequently, anything provably autographed by Jackson himself brings a premium when sold, including one autograph which was sold for $23,500 in 1990 ({{Inflation|US|23500|1990|fmt=eq|r=-3}}).<ref name=signature>{{cite news |title=Joe Jackson Autograph Auctioned for $23,500|page=1|agency=Associated Press|newspaper=The Nevada Daily Mail|date=December 9, 1990}}</ref> In restaurants, rather than ask someone to read the menu to him, he would wait until his teammates ordered and then order one of the items that he heard.<ref>Honig, Donald. ''The Man in the Dugout''.</ref>

In 1900, when he was 13 years old, his mother was approached by one of the owners of the [[Brandon Mill]], and he started to play for the mill's baseball team.<ref name="Fleitz p. 10">Fleitz p. 10</ref> He was the youngest player on the team. He was paid $2.50 to play on Saturdays ({{Inflation|US|2.5|1900|fmt=eq}}).<ref name="Fleitz p. 9"/> Jackson was initially a pitcher, but one day he accidentally broke another player's arm with a [[fastball]]. No one wanted to bat against him, so the team manager placed him in the outfield. Jackson's hitting ability made him a celebrity around town. Around that time, he was given a [[baseball bat]] that he named [[Black Betsy]].<ref name="Fleitz p. 10"/> He was compared to [[Champ Osteen]], another player from the mills who made it to the majors.<ref name="Fleitz p. 10"/> Jackson moved from mill team to mill team in search of better pay, playing [[semi-professional]] baseball by 1905.<ref name="Fleitz p. 10"/>

===Nickname===
In an interview published in the October 1949 edition of [[Sport (US magazine)|''Sport'']] magazine, Jackson recalled that he got his nickname during a mill game played in [[Greenville, South Carolina]]. Jackson had blisters on his foot from a new pair of [[Cleat (shoe)|cleats]], which hurt so much that he took his shoes off before he was [[at bat]]. As play continued, a heckling fan noticed Jackson running to third base in his socks and shouted, "You shoeless [[son of a gun]], you!" and the resulting nickname "Shoeless Joe" stuck with him throughout the remainder of his life.<ref name="joebio">{{cite web |title=Chicago Historical Society |work=chicagohs.com |url=http://www.chicagohs.org/history/blacksox/joe1.html |access-date=December 11, 2006 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130320092029/http://www.chicagohs.org/history/blacksox/joe1.html |archive-date=March 20, 2013}}</ref><ref>{{cite book |title=Shoeless Joe and Ragtime Baseball |isbn=9781630760090|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=c3U1DQAAQBAJ|access-date=January 7, 2019|last1=Frommer|first1=Harvey|date=October 2016|publisher=Rowman & Littlefield }}</ref>