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Re-enactors bringing history to life
To Brad Newton's mind, there's a lot of history in Pecos County. History that, for the most part, remains unknown to the descendants and successors of those who made it and lived it.
Whether he's recounting the tales of the demises of Barney Riggs or A.J. Royal, or regaling someone with the history of banditry along the Pecos River during the late 19th century, "Pecos Brad" is in full educational mode.
"We have as good a history as Tombstone," Newton said. "We want to explain the history of Fort Stockton and Pecos County. There are a lot of these stories yet to be told."
While Newton revels in educating an audience with the stories from the days of yore of Fort Stockton and Pecos County, he's also having a lot of fun.
For Newton doesn't just tell these stories of days gone by. He relives them as a re-enactor.
He's the founder of the Pecos River Gang, a 10-person group that re-enact events from the storied history of Pecos County. The Gang, which Newton started in 2002, has participated in Fort Stockton Living History Days, performed for Bridgestone/Firestone groups and had it out with Union Army and other gunfighter re-enactors, among their many activities.
"The skits we do are based on actual stories that happened in Fort Stockton," Newton said.
And if you're thinking it's just a bunch of older guys, you'd be wrong. Newton said that while the group has lost only one of its original members, it has new blood, including 19-year-old Uly Palomino, who as part of his duties with the City of Fort Stockton works at the fort.
"I've heard a lot of stories," said Palomino, who's in his first year with the group. "I enjoy the Old West, particularly western movies."
Meanwhile, back at the fort, there is another group of re-enactors, the Historic Fort Stockton Living History Unit. It's headed up by Robert Preston, who portrays a sergeant major from the period of the 1870s and 1880s.
While the Pecos River Gang is re-enacting some of the more nefarious personalities and events, the Living History Unit gives an insight into the lives of those who were stationed at Historic Fort Stockton.
Those tales are somewhat more mundane than those of the Gang.
"It was boring out here," Preston said. "There were no Indian attacks here at the post."
The Living History Unit recounts not just the lives of the soldiers, who included the Buffalo Soldiers, African-Americans who were former slaves and a few freedmen, but also some of the support staff that an army needed to survive.
Sandra Young portrays a laundress. They were largely illiterate women who did the washing, earning their meager pay and a shot of whiskey a day to keep the soldiers looking at least reasonably presentable.
"We actually know very little of what the everyday lives of the laundresses was like," Young said. "Most of them couldn't read or write. But the officers' wives kept diaries."
And the shot of whiskey the laundresses got each day, that perk wasn't extended to the soldiers whose clothes they laundered.
"They were all drunks anyway," Preston added with a wry smile.
Well, it was a tough life on the Texas frontier of the 19th century. But it was not exactly the life of novels and movies and nullifying misconceptions is one of the duties of a re-enactor.
It wasn't a life of non-stop, running gunfights, or constant Indian raids, Newton said.
"One of the biggest misconceptions is that this was a daily occurrence," Newton said, "that every day you had to get up and shoot somebody."
Still, there were a lot of colorful characters and events.
There was the assassination, still as yet unsolved, of Royal, the Pecos County sheriff. Or there was the untimely end for Riggs, who was gunned down by Buck Chadbourn outside what is now the oldest house in Fort Stockton.
There was Judge Roy Bean, appointed Justice of the Peace for Precinct 6 of Pecos County. He's a member of the Gang, portrayed by Ed "The Judge" Ferguson, one of the group's founding members.
"I have a lot of fun," he said of portraying Bean. "I get all the power, the respect, the fear."
Young has fun, too, even though she's not an intimidating type of laundress.
"I have a blast with it," she said. "I get to interact with a lot of people. It's really a hands-on demonstration."
But back to the educational value of the re-enacting - despite the fun the participants have, the fundamental purpose of re-enactments is to give people some idea of how people worked, lived and died.
Young and fellow Living History Unit re-enactor Elva Valadez both said that it's surprising how many people have little if any knowledge of the area's history.
"We have visitors from other places who know more about Fort Stockton history than our own children," Young said.
Added "Graveyard" Greg Ambris, a member of the Gang: "There is a lot of history that the kids don't know."
Perhaps they would if they realized how fun history really is.
"Some kids never grow up," Newton said.
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