A Visit To The Hometown Of The Mick

Mickey's childhood home is still today located at 319 South Quincy Street on the corner.

This is where Mickey lived from 1934 to 1944, from age 3 to 13

The house was home to Mickey, his parents, Mutt & Lovel, his sister Barbara, and his three bothers; Roy, Ray & Larry

In the side-yard of the house is where Mickey first learned to switch hit, as he has told in many a story.

Note that the house was originally wood siding, later in years the vinyl siding was added, as well as the smaller structure to the right side and the chainlink fence.

The area from the right side of the house to the metal garage was the are that Mickey and his dad and grandfather would practice, using the metal garage as a backstop.

The home is now under 'Re-Construction' putting it back into the original condition when Mickey lived there, the chain link fence, the second structure and the vinyl siding has been removed.



This is the metal garage that Mickey tells that he threw baseballs against and hit balls into while learning to play ball with his father and grandfather.

This metal garage definitely shows its age with rust and dents but is one of the most historic buildings in the town of Commerce, OK., in fact one of the most historic sports related buildings in the country.



This photo shows the metal garage, which is nothing more than a wooden frame covered with sheets of galvonized tin.



This used to be Commerce High School, where Mickey attended classes, it is now Commerce Middle School.



This is the sign at a baseball field that was created in 1955 and dedicated to Mutt Mantle in 1994.



This shot is from standing just behind second base... The field is quite small and is still in use today, Mickey never played here as a child since he was already in the majors by the time it was constructed.

There's No Joy In Mickville
By Wayne Coffey
October 15th 1995

COMMERCE, Okla... Just up the way from a sign advertising bulls for sale, the road that leads here bends to the east and undergoes a name change. It used to be Highway 69. It is now known as Mickey Mantle Boulevard.

The road is a two-lane strip of gas stations and churches, a desultory stretch of Dust Bowl dreariness, a few miles from Kansas and not much farther from Missouri. It takes you past long-dormant mines, and near a downtown dotted with abandoned storefronts and empty lots.

These are not easy times in northeast Oklahoma, and surely not in Commerce, an inappropriately named place where the people are friendly and the hope is that a little house, a corroded shed and the enduring legend of its most famous son might spark a brighter future.

It has been two months since Mickey Mantle's passing, and five days before what would've been his 64th birthday. It may be time to pay tribute to the Commerce Comet, and see if he can posthumously reverse a decline decades in the making.

"I can't help but feel people would come," said Vivian Foster, who has spent all of her 80 years in Commerce.

"He was the most sought after sports star ever, and still is," said police chief Robert Bain.

There are various Mantle-related initiatives afoot here. One is to rename the high school field in his honor. Another concerns the blue-and-white signs for Mickey Mantle Boulevard. Ever since the name change, the signs have been disappearing as fast as Mantle's home runs used to. So they decided to sell them, $20 apiece, proceeds to the volunteer fire department.

"We had 200 signs and sold out in the first week," said Dave Creason, captain of the fire department. (Signs can be ordered for $24, with a check to Commerce Fire Dept., Commerce, OK 74339).

But by far the most ambitious plan is for a Mickey Mantle Museum. Chief Bain is on a committee that launched the project several years ago.

They drew up sketches, commissioned an 18-foot statue and began raising funds by selling prints and replicas of the statue until Mantle's lawyer requested they stop, saying Mickey had a financial interest in another print.

Bain and others remain undeterred, and the centerpiece of the plan could wind up being the (now painted back original white) cream-colored house at 319 South Quincy St., where Mantle spent most of his boyhood.

The neighborhood is a jumble of small houses and shacks. The road is rough and dirty, but none of this matters, Dave Creason was saying, as he stood in front of the old Mantle place.

"There's a lot of history here," Creason said.

A chain-link fence surrounds the one-story house, and there's a towering elm in front. In the corner is an old tin shed, as rusty and bent as a roadside can. It was where Mickey learned to switch hit.

There's some added allure to the location, which is just a few hundred yards from Route 66, the fabled interstate.

The house is owned by two men from nearby Miami (pronounced MY-am-uh), Todd McClain and Brian Brassfield. They sold it last year through Leland's, the New York auction house, to a California entrepreneur. The price was $60,500, six times what it would fetch without a Mantle connection. The investorsplanned to move the house to Branson, Mo., but the sale fell through. McClain and Brassfield are reconsidering their options.

"We'd like to see (the museum) happen. It would certainly drive more people into town than are coming now," McClain said.

The population of Commerce is 2,600, about one-fourth of what it was 50 years ago, when it was a mining boom town, site of the world's biggest lead and zinc mill. Mickey's father was a miner. So was his grandfather, and most everyone else.

But the grade of mineral wasn't high, and the expense of extracting it was. The mines started to fade roughly 30 years ago. When a sprawling Goodrich plant closed 10 years ago, it was another stake in Commerce's heart. On a recent Saturday afternoon, the only thing moving downtown was the flag over the Disabled Veterans building.

Gerald Moudy is 62, and an old high school teammate of Mickey Mantle's. He'd love to see his friend honored, and thinks it can happen.

"All it takes is a few people to get enthused and be willing to make an effort to turn things around," he said.

Like lots of folks, Moudy remembers Mantle fondly, and was proud of the humility and candor he showed in getting sober and admitting his wrongs. It wiped out any hard feelings about his infrequent trips back, about the times he drank too much and got nasty, and wouldn't even sign autographs.

"When he went on TV (with Bob Costas) and said he wasn't nobody's hero, people loved him again over that," Chief Bain said.

"People know that wasn't Mickey's true self when he acted like that," Vivian Foster said.

Foster and her husbandlive at 319 North Maple, a yellow house they bought from Mickey and Merlyn Mantle in 1960. It was custom-built for the Mantles, right down to the M.M. carved into the kitchen counter.

It is just another piece of Mantle history here, not far from the pool hall where Mickey used to hustle money in high school, or the Little League field where he played ball, a field now named after his father, Mutt. That was done last year, at Mickey's urging. The sign behind the plate reads: "Father of Commerce's World Famous Ballplayer."

Nor is it far from another Mantle haunt, the corner bar where Mickey used to go with his buddies, Billy Martin and Whitey Ford. The place is now called Joe's Lounge. It is located on Mickey Mantle Boulevard, which runs sad and straight on the eastern edge of town. It is the road that leads you here, the road of an enduring legend, the Comet who may be Commerce's last hope.