On the 50th anniversary of the sport’s most transcendent moment, Major League Baseball gave an unprecedented and deserved tribute to its central figure.

As the Mets faced the team he played for and a few miles from the stadium where he broke the color barrier, Jackie Robinson‘s number 42 was retired league-wide.

The announcement was made during a special in-game ceremony on the field after the fifth inning. Jackie’s widow Rachel Robinson, President Bill Clinton, and Commissioner Bud Selig gave speeches before a sellout crowd and a national TV audience. Other dignitaries were a part of the 54,000-plus in attendance, including former teammates and other ballplayers who followed in Robinson’s footsteps after that historic afternoon at Ebbets Field in 1947 when he played first base for the Brooklyn Dodgers.

”No. 42 belongs to Jackie Robinson for the ages,” Selig said. Special exception was given to the players who were currently wearing the number as a salute to Robinson — among them the Mets’ Butch Huskey, Boston’s Mo Vaughn, and Yankees closer Mariano Rivera.

Clinton, on the injured list because of a bad knee and using walking canes to move, spoke to the significance of Robinson’s legacy and why it was important that No. 42 was permanently retired across Major League Baseball.

”It’s hard to believe that it was 50 years ago that a 28-year-old rookie changed the face of baseball and the face of America forever,” he said. “Jackie Robinson scored the go-ahead run that day; we’ve all been trying to catch up ever since.”

Clinton then introduced Rachel Robinson, who received the warmest ovation.

”I believe the greatest tribute we can pay to Jackie Robinson is to gain new support for a more equitable society,” she said, ”and in this heady environment of unity it is my hope that we can carry this living legacy beyond this glorious moment.”

Following the 35-minute ceremony, the Mets added to a 2-0 lead with three seventh-inning runs in what would turn into a shutout of the Los Angeles Dodgers, but it was merely a footnote that evening.

”If Jackie Robinson were here today,” Clinton also said during the in-game ceremony, ”he would say we have done a lot of good in the last 50 years, but we could do a lot better.”

Those words still hold true. Now, every player, coach, and manager wears No. 42 each April 15th in celebrating the extraordinary legacy of an American hero.