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Sunday, April 23, 2006
Re-Enactors Relish Bringing New Spain to Life for Tricentennial
By Dan Mayfield
Journal Staff Writer
For some of us, the city's Tricentennial weekend is a chance to think about Albuquerque's past and what people went through to found it.
But for others, it's a chance to live it.
Sometime late this morning a group of historical re-enactors will walk into Old Town in a traditional La Entrada, completely immersed in the 1700s.
From their horses to their clothes, their weapons, wagons, animals, food and even language, the group is re-enacting the voyage of some of the city's original founding families.
"We're doing it to make history come alive," said Steve Armbrecht, one of the organizers of Entrada 300, a nonprofit group that is participating in, but separate from the city's Tricentennial celebration.
For these folks, it's a chance to reconnect with their own past, to feel a little bit of what their families did when they came to the Rio Grande valley in the late 1600s and early 1700s.
"I just like it because this is how my family came here," said Anthony Segura, who is participating in La Entrada.
Segura will be wearing an outfit that looks like it's more out of "Pirates of the Caribbean" than "Man of La Mancha," but baggy pantaloons and blousey shirts were the style.
But, Segura is worried about the 28-mile trek the group will make from Bernalillo to Old Town. He'll be riding a Spanish barb horse on the voyage, and it's been years since he's ridden a horse.
Regardless, he said, he can't wait.
Spanish families came to the valley, said Armbrecht, with only the clothes on their backs and wooden caretas to hold their possessions.
"When we talk to schoolchildren, we tell them it's like moving all your possessions across the globe in a Volkswagen," Armbrecht said.
Times were rough. There were no GPS locators to tell the families where to go, and only crude maps to tell where the bridges over the rio were.
The horses needed food and rest, so did the travelers.
There were no gas ranges for tailgate parties, only sticks. Instead of kicking back to watch "The Lion King" on back-seat DVD players, the kids had to help drive the cattle and the horses.
The group's 28-mile trip started Saturday in Bernalillo. Last night, the group camped at the Bernalillo County Sheriff's Posse Grounds for a matanza, and is expected to arrive sometime today in Old Town.
The trip will follow the old Camino Real, which is now N.M. 313. The animals will be driven on the sides of the road, while a police escort limits vehicle traffic.
But for most of those involved in La Entrada, the trip has become an obsession.
"Everybody has a passion," Armbrecht said.
For Francisco Osuna, it's the barb horses.
For Pátryka Durán y Chaves, it's the clothes.
For others, it's the music.
"We have one woman coming who's making makeup just like they used in the 1700s," Armbrecht said.
One woman is making dishes similar to those used in the 1700s. Others are wearing period shoes, using period saddles, and a group from Arizona has hand crafted a careta similar to the kind used by the Spanish during the period.
For Michael Vigil, it's all about the weapons.
"I made my stuff, even the sword," Vigil said. "It's a typical espada ancha," or Spanish sword from the period.
He'll be hard to miss, dressed as a Spanish military officer, including a royal blue coat, black boots, huge floppy hat and leather sash.
His sword, at about 2 feet long, looks more like a short sword. But, Vigil said, most of the soldiers' swords got shorter and shorter as time went on because they'd break parts off to use for a plow, or they would get worn when they were used as machetes.
"They had a lot of wear and tear on them," he said.
Most of the original ciboleros, or buffalo hunters of the day, would use these short swords to tackle the buffalo that roamed the area, Osuna said, often using specially trained horses.
Though Vigil will be wearing period guns on his hips today, they're not Spanish. Instead, Vigil has a pair of period one-shot .70 caliber French pistols that have Chippendale detailing befitting a royal cavalry officer.
He also made a cuera, or a buff coat. The coat of thick sheepskin is padded and detailed with pounded wool felt, just like the coats the original conquistadors wore, he said, and very similar to the type used later by Americans in the Revolutionary War.
The coat weighs almost 25 pounds and is so thick, "The cuera would be bulletproof. Not only would you see the Spanish wearing them but the Indians as well."
They were hot, stinky, dirty and heavy, but safe.
It's a far cry from what Pátryka Durán y Chaves will be wearing.
She looks like Queen Isabella in her handmade, $1,500, gown of velvet, brocade and lace. Just like gowns of the day, it's corset is fully boned and she must stand stiff and straight to make it fit right.
For others, the fashions of the day were more about function that form.
Polly Sisneros de la Serna made many of the costumes by hand using old portraits as her guide.
From pantaloons to gowns and dresses and coats, she found fabric that approximated the original stuff and stitched it together.
"We had a catalog and worked for days to make them," she said.
What's really astonishing is the level of detail. From the laces on the mens' jabots to the types of leather they're using to make the cueras.