Major League Baseball Player. He is best known today for being the most recognizable of the eight Chicago White Sox players who were banned forever from Major League Baseball for their role in the 1919 "Black Sox" scandal. Born in Greenville, South Carolina, in 1902 he became a cotton textile worker with Brandon Mills, sweeping the floors where his father and brother worked. He soon joined the company baseball team in what was called the Textile League. A natural player, by 1904 he had become one of its best-known players. In 1908 he left the mills to become a professional baseball player with the Greenville Spinners, and it was during his time with the team that he obtained his nickname in 1909 when he removed his new, tight-fitting shoes, which were causing blisters, to run around the bases in his socks during a game. In his first season, he batted .350, and was clearly recognized as one of the best players in his new league. In 1910, the Philadelphia Athletics bought his contract, and the next year he was traded to the Cleveland Indians. In 1915 he moved to the Chicago White Sox. In 1919 he discovered that seven players had gotten together to throw the World Series, and Jackson was offered $20,000 to join them. Jackson refused, but the gamblers used his name as being in on the fix to lure other bettors. When he played, he turned in a strong performance, scoring five runs and driving in six more. His average was .375 and he had 12 hits during the World Series, setting a new record. But in the five losses (all with Eddie Cicotte or Lefty Williams as the starting pitcher), he batted only .286, and had no walks or RBI and scored only one unearned run before hitting a solo home run in the final game with Chicago trailing 5-0; he later added a two-run double and scored after the White Sox had fallen behind 10-1. In contrast, he batted .545 with three RBI in the three wins, including a crucial 10th-inning single in Game 6. He also fielded 30 balls without an error. When the scandal was revealed, a grand jury was held in 1920, and he was called before it. Owner Charlie Comiskey denied knowledge of the fix (to do so would tarnish his reputation, since he did nothing to stop it), and Joe Jackson was indicted. Although the resulting trial jury found him innocent of taking a bribe, after key evidence including Jackson's signed confession disappeared from the courthouse, the new baseball commissioner, Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis, banned all of the Black Sox players from professional baseball for life. After the ban, Jackson returned to Greenville, South Carolina, where he became a successful shopkeeper, running a dry cleaning store and later a liquor store, until his death in 1951 of a heart attack. Although banned from professional baseball, he continued to play ball for free for local teams until 1933, when he stopped due to age. According to an interview given by him, the famous question asked him by a kid after the grand jury hearing "Say it ain't so, Joe" was never spoken, and was apparently made up by a newspaper reporter.