Mickey Charles Mantle
Mickey Charles Mantle
“I was born and bred to be a big-league baseball player.”
Biography
Mickey Charles Mantle was born in Spavinaw, Oklahoma, the eldest of five children of Elvin and Lovell Mantle. Mantle’s “big chance” came in 1950 when Casey Stengle invited him to the Yankee farm school in Phoenix, Arizona. On his first time to face a Yankee pitcher, Mickey, hitting right-handed, slammed a home run over the right field fence. On his next time at bat he left-handed a homer into left field. Stengle was quoted as saying, “I believe that Mantle is our biggest prize and that he’s the No. 1 kid ball player in the professional game.” Mickey Mantle was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame in January of 1974.
Fun fact
Mickey Mantle was voted the most popular Yankee of all time and held the record for the most games played in a Yankees uniform—2,401. His portrait by famous western artist Kenneth Wyatt was unveiled in 1997 and hangs in Oklahoma’s State Capitol building.
Oklahoma connections
Mantle was born in Spavinaw, Oklahoma, on October 20, 1931, and moved to Commerce, Oklahoma, when he was four years old.