Wild west fun rumbles every day at Alamo Village

November 8, 2007
By Bill Sontag
Feature Writer

Shahan Ranch longhorns put the frosting on the cake, climaxing the annual October trail ride. Thundering with riders and cowboys through Main Street of Alamo Village, the noisy herd was the long-awaited reward for delighted guests and visitors, most protected behind adobe walls and rustic fences during the spectacle. It happens next in March 2008. (LIVE! photo/Bill Sontag) (click image to enlarge)

Despite the offered sale of the 50-year-old landmark north of Bracketville, there’s no particular reason to hurry to experience Alamo Village before it closes.

According to Shahan Ranch matriarch Virginia Shahan, Alamo Village is bustling, not closing. The ranching family hopes to see important changes that will allow the rustic operation to continue and the dreams of “Happy” and Virginia Shahan to flourish. Tulisha Wardlaw, Shahan’s daughter, estimates that Alamo Village hosted 25,000 visitors in 2007, and she anticipates greater things ahead.

In addition to Alamo Village’s legendary reputation in the film and broadcast industries, international tourists and American travelers put this unique attraction on their list of “musts” when they sweep through southwest Texas enroute to Mexico, Big Bend National Park or San Antonio.

“We’ve had an absolutely exciting experience here,” remarked a dazzled Sussex, England visitor, Sunday (Oct. 21), blinking back the dust still settling behind a clattering herd of Texas longhorns in the village’s Main Street. The annual Alamo Village Traildrive, tourist riders and professional wranglers, had just climaxed their three-day trek on the 26-square-mile Shahan Ranch, galloping boisterously through an appreciative audience in the warm, fall sunlight.

An afternoon sun finally peeks through grumbling clouds over the Alamo movie set built by John Wayne and "Happy" Shahan for Wayne's 1960 blockbuster movie, The Alamo. Though box office receipts were disappointing, the Oscar-nominated movie starred John Wayne as Davy Crockett, Richard Widmark as Jim Bowie, and Laurence Harvey as William Barrett Travis. The set and Alamo Village have now served as locations for more than 50 films and television productions. (LIVE! photo/Bill Sontag) (click image to enlarge)

The village and the replica Alamo fortress, 100 yards apart, were designed in 1957 by actor John Wayne and Kinney County rancher James T. “Happy” Shahan as a movie set for Wayne’s 1960 production of The Alamo. But, even today, the rustic feel of the place elicits an emotional detachment from wars in the Middle East and melting polar ice caps. Set as it is in miles of desert scrub with limitless horizons in all directions, only seven miles north of Brackettville, Alamo Village is an entertaining, shoot-em-up, rough humor, cultural oasis where everything looks as if it’s been “rode hard and put away wet.”

At 91, Virginia Shahan still roars over the cobbly, caliche terrain in a powerful pickup, and rests in the high-ceilinged ranch house perched atop a hill that affords panoramic views of the 17,000-acre ranch. This year, the vista is a multi-hued spectacle of green mantling a normally beige desert, complementing the overhead brilliance of a cobalt sky. “Oh, honey, you’re seeing this in its Sunday dress best,” said Shahan as we careened over steep tracks that might daunt a hiker, but not a determined, nonagenarian ranchwoman in a good truck.

Shahan Ranch matriarch Virginia Shahan holds forth with comments about Alamo Village as a major film and television production site as well as substantial tourism attraction. The great room of the Shahan Ranch house, high on a hill above the village, boasts a huge fireplace which Shahan says was designed so she wouldn't have to make many trips with small logs to keep the room warm. (LIVE! photo/Bill Sontag) (click image to enlarge)

Though her parents lived 75 miles north in Rocksprings, Shahan was born in tumultuous times, delivered in Del Rio, February 15, 1916. Only three weeks later, Pancho Villa and 500 of his revolutionaries invaded Columbus, N.M., killing 17 Americans and pillaging the small town. In Europe, World War I swirled, luring a reluctant United States into global conflict. Virginia Webb’s deliverer was well-known general practitioner Dr. H.B. Ross, with an office in what is now the ice cream parlor and gift shop, Emporium, 800 S. Main St.

“My father ranched in Edwards County for a lot of years, but he decided that this was a warmer place for cattle. He found he could breed the cows a month earlier, and the calves would drop a month earlier, so he could get them on the market that much earlier,” said Shahan. “This was steer country, and the steers were shipped out when they were three years old. That’s all anyone around the country wanted to eat in those days.”

But cattle were not the only residents of the ranch’s warmer, protected lowlands. “When we came in here there were wolves everywhere,” Shahan explained. “So we had dogs to protect everyone from the wolves. My father pretty well cleaned them out of this country, but my sister and I used to stir the mush to feed those dogs. I came up in the hard times and the good times, and I’m so happy I did. They taught me a lot that kids today don’t understand at all, but then I don’t understand a lot of what’s going on in this country, either.”

Then the ranch was twice the size it is today, and had a “Running W” brand for the Webb surname. In 1939, she married James T. Shahan at Baylor University, Waco, and the ranch’s brand changed to “HV” reflecting the new ownership of Happy and Virginia. Their 57-year marriage ended when Happy died in 1996.

The Shahan spread remains a working ranch with cattle and sheep. And goats? “Well, that question goes without talking about it. Of course, we’ve got goats! Everyone has goats. They’re really not even worth talking about,” Shahan shot back. But the place remains a family operation, with her daughter, Tulisha Wardlaw, wife of Hadley Wardlaw, supervising Alamo Village operations. “She’s my right arm, my right leg, and anything else I can think of,” quipped Shahan. Her son, Tully, helps take care of the ranch livestock operations, and the whole enterprise is assisted by Shahan’s daughter, Jamie, and son-in-law, Walter Rains.

"Blanco," a white mule that traveled from Austin to participate in the Alamo Village Trailride, Oct. 21, casually supports his owner's moment of rest in front of the Cantina. Roger McCown participates in trail rides around Texas with "Blanco," demonstrating that mules are not the cantankerous critters of their undeserved reputation. (LIVE! photo/Bill Sontag) (click image to enlarge)

Alamo Village is reached on Ranch Road 674, from the center of Brackettville. A greeter at the well-marked entrance provides a map and takes admission fees, then directs visitors up a winding road past the Alamo movie set to parking just beyond at the edge of the village. Remarkably, the place is open every day, 9 a.m. – 6 p.m., other than a one-week hiatus for employees at Christmastime.

In the village, guests have access to more than a dozen buildings, some with static displays such as the John Wayne Museum, a couple of dusty rooms with posters, a collection of photographs, costumes, weapons and a pair of 19th century cannons. There’s a carriage house jammed with wagons, buggies and an ancient hearse, most with brightly colored spoked wheels. Visitors can also peek into a bank, chapel, and sheriff’s office.

The Indian Store displays – but doesn’t sell – many truly impressive, framed, historic collections of arrowheads, points and scraping knives. Moccasins and other gifts related in some way to Native American lore, legend and trinketry are sold. At the Trading Post, merchandise ranging from shelves of toys manufactured in China to cap guns, statues, wind chimes, Texas flags, and movie memorabilia are offered by store manager Jana Murray, who also doubles as “Miss Kitty” in village shows and skits. “We’ve got something for everyone,” said Murray.

Summertime schedules include a quartet of gunfights in the streets of the village, staged by desperadoes and lawmen, strictly family entertainment, Shahan insists. The skirmishes are always preceded with a mood-setting musical in the Cantina. “There’s something for the movie lover and the movie maker,” is the Alamo Village promise.

The 2008 calendar of special events, Shahan said, will be a successful repeat of this year, including another trail drive of Texas longhorn steers in March and again in October, a gunfighters’ competition and fast-draw contest in July, and the 48th Annual Cowboy Horse Races. Labor Day is a nine-hour, continuous event, crammed with roping contests, demonstrations, western music, trail rides, horseback rides, sheep shearing and cattle branding demonstrations, all centered around a barbecue feast at noon.

A red steer turns a regal head of the longest, lateral horns in the Shahan Ranch herd to gaze inquisitively at the approaching photographer. Roughly seven feet, tip-to-tip, the spiraling headgear always draws attention from admiring Alamo Ranch visitors. (LIVE! photo/Bill Sontag) (click image to enlarge)

The Alamo Village Cantina is open every day, too, and features cheeseburgers, Mexican food, barbecue, cold beverages, and a breakfast menu. For additional information about Alamo Village, see www.alamovillage.com, or call 830-563-2580 or E-mail at happy@hilconnet.com for detailed schedule and price information.

SIDEBAR:

Movies made at Alamo Village

1951 Arrowhead - Charlton Heston
1955 The Last Command - Ernest Borgnine
1958 Five Bold Women - Irish McCalla
1959 John Wayne's "The Alamo"
1960 The Spirit of the Alamo (TV) - NBC

Jana Murray, proprietress of the Alamo Village Trading Post, welcomes visitors and Shahan Ranch guests to her emporium of gift and souvenir items, most theme-related to the wild west or what movie goers – young and old – have come to believe about the true west. Murray doubles as actress, playing the role of dance hall hostess, "Kitty," in Alamo Village musicals and skits. (LIVE! photo/Bill Sontag) (click image to enlarge)

1960 Roy Rogers Show (TV)
1960 John Ford's - Two Rode Together - Jimmy Stewart
1966 Top Hand (TV)
1967 Aye, That Pancho Villa (TV)
1967 Bandolero - Dean Martin
1968 Children's West (Lon Chaney, Jr.) (TV)
1973 A Death in Tombstone
1974 The Texas Ballad (KLRN-TV)
1978 Adventures of Jody Shanan
1978 Centennial, "The Longhorns" (TV) - Dennis Weaver
1979 Code of Josey Wales - Michael Parks
1980 Barbarosa - Gary Busey
1980 Seguin (American Playhouse) - Edward James Olmos
1981 "Kathleen" Kestrel Films
1982 Tennessee to Texas - A Musical Affair (TV) - Tanya Tucker
1984 Up Hill All The Way -Burt Reynolds
1986 Houston - Legend of Texas (TV) - Sam Elliott

From the belfry of Old San Fernando Church, "Marshal" Richard Curilla keeps an eye open for an approaching herd of Texas longhorn steers, driven by trail ride participants, Sunday (Oct. 21). As they rumble into view, Curilla slams peals from the bell, alerting visitors below to get ready for the entrada. Curilla is far from his childhood home among the anthracite coal mines of northeastern Pennsylvania. Here he directs gunfights and fast-draw demonstrations, adding, "I also run interference between filming companies, tourists, and Virginia Shahan." (LIVE! photo/Bill Sontag) (click image to enlarge)

1986 The Alamo - Thirteen Days To Glory (TV) - Alec Baldwin
1986 No Safe Haven - Wings Hauser
1987 Alamo: Price of Freedom - Caser Biggs
1988 Lonesome Dove (TV) - Robert Duvall
1989 Gunsmoke - The Last Apache (TV) - James Arness
1991 JCV Japanese Quiz Show (TV)
1991 American Movie Classics (TV - Bob Dorian
1992 Rio Diablo (TV) - Travis Tritt
1992 Travis Smith (direct to video)
1993 Bad Girls - Madeleine Stowe
1994 Gambler V (TV) - Kenny Rogers
1994 James A. Michener's, "Texas" (TV) - John Schneider
1994 Good Old Boys (TV) - Sam Shephard
1995 Streets of Laredo (TV) - James Garner
1995 A&E History Channel's "The Alamo" (TV)
1995 Discovery Channel's - "The Battes of the Alamo" (TV)
1995 PBS - Ken Burns "The West" (TV)
1995 A&E Biography - "Davy Crockett: American Frontier Legend" (TV)
1995 The Learning Channel's - "Famous Battles" - Alamo Segment (TV)
1995 Discovery Channel's - Buffalo Soldiers" (TV)
1996 Once upon A Time In China and America - Sammo Hung
1999 Alamo... The New Defenders (direct to video)
1999 The Bullfighter - Domineca Scorcese
1999 The History Channel's - "Haunted San Antonio" (TV)
2000 Jericho - Mark Valley - Leon Coffee - Buck Taylor

Ninety-one-year-old Virginia Shahan, owner and sovereign guardian of the ranch and Alamo Village, pauses for barbecue lunch amidst trail hands and riders fresh from the October trail ride. Shahan was raised on the ranch before she met and eventually married James T. "Happy" Shahan in 1939, and still scrambles aggressively over the hills and flats of desert scrub in a heavy-duty pickup truck. (LIVE! photo/Bill Sontag) (click image to enlarge)

2001 The History Channel's "History vs Hollywood" (TV)
2002 "Westown" Sturghill Productions
2006 Blue Eyes - Walker Cable Productions
2006 Mexican Gold - Walker Cable Productions
2007 The Man Who Came Back - Walker Cable Productions - Eric Braden - Billy Zane
2007 - Friend of The Devil (TV Pilot)