This illustration comes from the sermon "Crawling Out Of The Anger Hole" by Rev. Jeffrey Stratton of Evansville, Indiana. I also found it in six other sermons in the Kerux database and I believe it originated (for preachers) in the Leadership magazine, Vol. 16, "To Illustrate" as a submission by Scott Bowerman of Bishopville, South Carolina. It is a great illustration on rage and anger:
In a biography of the life of Mickey Mantle there is a story told about a hunting trip that Mickey and Billy Martin took together in the off season in the early sixties. Mickey Mantle was known as much for his excesses as he was for his prodigious home run power. Mickey hit hard, played hard, drank hard and when Mickey got angry, it was said that he burned hotter than most anyone and was capable of anything during his fits of anger.
On this particular hunting trip the "Mick" and Billy Martin (by the way, Martin is also known for his ability to go off the deep end as well) traveled to upstate New York to hunt deer on the farm of a friend of Mickey’s. Upon arriving at his friends farm, Mickey left the truck to notify the friend that they would be hunting on his farm that day.
The friend agreed but asked Mickey to do a favor for him. The friend had an old mule that was very sick and the friend wanted to put the poor animal out of his misery but didn’t have the heart to do it so he asked Mickey if he would stop at the barn down the road and "put him down" for him.
Mickey agreed but thought he would play a practical joke on Billy Martin as well as doing a favor for a friend. Mickey stormed out of the house, jumped in the truck, hurled a few expletives at the man and told Billy that the man had refused to let them hunt. As they drove past the barn, Mickey stated, "I’ll show that blankety-blank. I’m going to go in that barn and shoot his favorite mule! You can’t do this to Mickey Mantle and Billy Martin!"
He threw the truck into reverse and skidded to a stop in the barnyard road. Mickey strutted into the barn, leveled his gun at the mule and "blam!", shoots the animal dead. As Mickey is checking to make sure the mule is dead, he hears two gunshots from the barnyard. He runs out to find Billy Martin outside the truck with his rifle against his shoulder. Mickey asked, "Martin, what in the ____ are you doing?" Martin yelled back, "We’ll show that so-and-so farmer, I just shot two of his cows!"
One might wonder how Martin could get caught up in a practical joke to that degree. But, apparently he had seen Mickey do some things in anger and thought that he was capable of getting angry enough and losing control enough to shoot a friend’s mule dead.
Have you ever shot any mules? Are you capable of shooting mules? Have others seen a side of you that would lead them to believe that you are capable of such fits of anger?
Barbara Mikkelson of Snopes.com says Billy Martin himself actually told this story on David Letterman's show on April 16, 1987, and Martin said it happened on a hunting trip with Mantle and Whitey Ford. Unfortunately for Billy Martin’s credibility, his "personal experience" turns up the 1945 Morton Thompson book "Joe, The Wounded Tennis Player". (Martin, Mantle, and Ford didn’t become teammates until the 1950s.) So it is a funny story on anger, but just a story.
