A Houston Chronicle reporter and photographer are joining the Northeastern Trail Riders...
Martin González pictured holding his grandson, Chronicle reporter Sam González Kelly, outside his childhood home in Higueras, Mexico, some time in the late 1990s. González was known as"El Diablo En Caballo" in the small, northeast Mexican town before emigrating to Chicago in the 1950s.
The cushioned seats of the sound truck were vastly more comfortable than the hard wooden benches of the wagon. Plus, I was sheltered from the rain that poured down as we set out from camp this morning onto the back roads that took us through quiet neighborhoods to Highway 90, before settling at the Crosby Fair and Rodeo grounds.
I’d have wanted to ride with them no matter what they were driving, but even if I hadn't already been inclined, Mercedes would have won me over. She has a microphone on hand to spread her infectious positivity, and greets everything and everyone she sees.She shifts from Zydeco music to “Le Freak,” the 80s disco funk song by Chic.
Brian tears up sometimes, dropping his head into his hands when asked about his father, who died in 2016 at the age of 89. Mercedes took over the DJ duties a few years earlier, after it became difficult for Shorty to handle the equipment, but they saved him a spot in the van and he rode with the Northeastern Trail Riders until about a year before his death.
“He would always tell me he loved me when we got off the phone, and I got tired of hearing it because I didn’t see him loving himself,” Mercedes said. “You can’t love somebody else if you don’t love yourself.” My task was small but I embraced it eagerly; when it comes to the horse-and-wagon teams, I've spent most of my time just trying to stay out of the way. It was nice not to feel like dead weight for a change.
Indeed, he sent a text to his grandson, Caleb Perry, on Monday asking him to send Max and John, two family mules, to come pick him up, cracking up many of the longtime trail riders. A horse is tied to a donation box during a rest stop on day three of the Northeastern Trail Riders six-day journey from Beaumont to Houston to kick off the Houston Rodeo on Tuesday, Feb. 21, 2023 in Dayton."If they ever would learn their history of trail riding..." she says."I would just hate for it get lost."
Roberts raises 12 horses on her property in Katy, and was a formidable barrel racer back in her day. She was also my riding partner when I got in the saddle on Monday, helping adjust my stirrups and direct my horse. Not that I have any. Bruno paired me up with his favorite mare, Liz, a 25-year-old American Quarter Horse, after testing my riding skills at camp on Sunday night. After a few laps around the pasture with T.K., a rider who tells me he’s only shouting at me now so he doesn’t have to do it on the trail, Bruno offers a positively glowing review: “he can turn left and right and stop, that’s all he’s gotta do.
“One day I’m going to get old and not be able to do it, so why not pass it down to the kids who love it and are able to do it,” says Anthony Kallie, the trail ride’s chief scout. Joseph S. Bruno and a handful of others founded the Northeast Trail Riders Association in 1982 because they felt that the Acres Homes-based Prairie View Trail Ride, where many of NETRA’s older riders got their start, wasn’t properly recognizing the Texas and Louisiana Gulf Coast heritage of the group’s Kashmere Gardens contingent. The elder Bruno was the association's inaugural trail boss and served in the role for about 30 years, until his son was elected to succeed him.
Though the majority of spectators greeted the trail riders with smiles and cheers, a Confederate flag hanging in the window of a home on the trail today served as a poignant reminder that there still remain those who would rather leave that slice of southern history unacknowledged. The Northeast Trail Riders Association, with Zydeco music blaring and Texas flags waving, don’t give them that choice.
Caleb Perry Sr., the chaplain, has been chosen to deliver the sermon at “cowboy church” ahead of the trail ride’s launch out of Cheek, Texas, near Beaumont. A quiet, thoughtful young man, Perry has decided to focus on the concept of reflection and “the hand of God on your life.” Northeastern Trail Riders trail boss Anthony Bruno gets a bit emotional as he talks about his father during a prayer service before the riders make their way from Beaumont to Houston on Sunday, Feb. 19, 2023.Members of the Northeastern Trail Riders hold their hats in prayer during a short service before they start a six-day journey from Beaumont to Houston to kick off the Houston Rodeo on Sunday, Feb. 19, 2023.
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