By Horace Gore
Joe Martin is known far and wide as “The Snake Man.” For the last 43 years, Joe has been a feature attraction at the Hunters Extravaganzas, with his large pen full of diamondback rattlesnakes and other poisonous and non-poisonous reptiles. Crowds gather as Joe and his assistants demonstrate how fast a rattler can strike a balloon filled with air, and to see Joe caress a big rattlesnake wrapped around his neck. It’s enough to startle a rhino!
Joe is a native of San Antonio and has lived his entire 70 years within sight of the Alamo. After high school, he bounced around for a while and got into catching snakes for money.
“I have been fascinated with poisonous snakes since I was a kid,” Joe said. “I started catching rattlesnakes with some friends and selling them to the snake farm.” Joe has been associated with “snake charming” ever since he started catching and selling snakes.
“Back then, I caught and handled snakes with a long-handled prod that allowed me to do snakes at a distance. It was later that I got into handing them by hand, and discovered that people would pay to watch me do all sorts of things with poisonous snakes. During the last 50 years, I have taken my snakes all over the country: Texas, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Louisiana, Alabama, and once in Michigan. I guess I’ve always liked to handle dangerous things like rattlesnakes, and get away with it,” Joe said, smiling.
“There’s something about living dangerously in front of a crowd,” he added. However, Joe admits that after all the years, it’s just another day at the office. Jerry Johnston started his Texas Trophy Hunters Association in 1975, and a short time later, he asked Joe to bring his snakes to the Extravaganza at the Convention Center. Since then, Joe Martin’s Snakes of Texas has been a top attraction at all of the shows.
“The shows in Fort Worth, Houston and San Antonio have been the best and biggest through the years,” Joe said. “The snakes have been a big hit with all the folks who attend the shows. I haven’t had any problems with having the shows in the cities, although Houston tried to run me out of town one time a few years ago. We made a few phone calls and got it straightened out, and the show went on.”
“I have always tried to educate the crowds about snakes as part of the show. Most people are afraid of snakes, and they should be careful around rattlesnakes, copperheads, cottonmouths, and coral snakes. I used all of these different snakes in the show.”
What does Joe wear for protection while doing a show? “Nothing more than snake-proof boots,” he replied. “Boots that are all-leather. That will turn a striking rattler. I don’t use anything else.”
“Do you use the same snakes for an entire season of shows?” I asked. Joe said he uses the same snakes for a season, but gets new snakes each year. “Fresh snakes put on a good show, but they get used to being handled after a while. I pay close attention to the snakes that I hold close to my head and face. You can’t be too careful with a rattlesnake!”
“People always ask me ‘how many times have you been bitten?’ Well, I’ve been lucky, except for a few years in the ’90s. During that decade, I was bitten by three diamondback rattlers and one coral snake. They were all minor bites, as I was handling the snakes, but I got pretty sick with all of them. I’ve had assistants get bitten—some pretty bad. We try to be careful, and not get a snake bite in front of the crowd.”
Another question Joe gets from the crowd is, “Do snakes ever get out of the pen?” Joe says no poisonous snakes have ever escaped, but a few non-poisonous ones, such as bull snakes, Texas rat snakes, and coachwhips have crawled out over the top. “Poisonous snakes are not climbers, but some of the bigger non-poisonous snakes are good climbers, and can escape the pen.”
Through the years, I have gotten a big kick out of walking up to the snake pen and asking Joe if he had caught that big rattler that got away. The kids always scatter, or look down at their feet when I say something about a loose snake.
Joe is hanging it up, and says that he won’t do the snakes anymore. “The show will go on, but I won’t be in it,” Joe said when asked about the 2020 Extravaganzas. “After 50 years of snakes, I think it is time to quit.” The crowds will miss Joe at the Extravaganzas, and so will his old friends who have enjoyed his shows and Joe Martin The Snake Man for 43 years.
