CRIXELL FAMILY EPITOMIZES LINK FROM PAST AND PRESENT

By Juan Montoya
Some recent arrivals to Browntown (or those who left and came back), may not remember the old Amber Pub.
The Amber Pub was located approximately where the new Veterans Memorial Park and the Central Public library are today. The motel was torn down after complaints started to mount against the harboring of hundreds of Central American refugees by coyotes who were waiting to move them on up to Houston or other large cities. Many were Salvadorans who received refugee status and permission to travel around the United States because of the civil war in their country.
It just so happened that the Amber Pub was where a local rock and roll group had some of their first gigs. They were the original Connectors which had Albert Besteiro and Joey Tamayo and Freddie Longoria which later morphed into a number of other groups when then principals took to the road and landed, among other places, in San Francisco, Austin, etc.
Just recently, before George Ramirez's Half Moon went into renovation and remodeling mode, Emilio and his Bluzanos used to play on a regular basis alternating with Joe Kinney's Cobbleheads and other venues on South Padre Island.
One of the last times the Bluzanos played at the Half Moon manager Juan Castillo projected a historical photo of downtown Brownsville from 1906. It was the arrival of the Buffalo Soldiers in Brownsville who arrived despite the protests of the town's leading white and Hispanic citizens. Just over the Crixell's left shoulder, the old Crixell Saloon sign could be seen distinctly on the wall.
The juxtaposition of the living musician and the historical photo bearing his surname from 110 years ago is evidence of the resilience of many local pioneer families. Emilio's uncle, Adolph Crixell, has spent a lot of his retirement time (he is a pharmacist) digging into the family's history.
 Come next Aug. 9, 1912, it'll be 104 years since that fateful day when City Marshal Joe Crixell – distant ancestor of the Crixell's – was shot down in the family saloon on Elizabeth Street by a former Texas Ranger allied with his political opponents.
The full story is yet to be told of that sad affair and we're sure Adolph has been uncovering bits of that history that have not been told.

But the musical legacy of the Crixell's is a bit happier. In 1993, Vincent Crixell, father of Adolph and Vincent Crixell, (and grandfather of Emilio) passed away in Brownsville. If musical genes were to be traced, that is probably the root of the strand.
In 1934, he played at the Democratic National Convention where Alfred Smith was nominated for president. He was also the organizer and leader of the "Orquesta Tipica Mixteca" which played the first Charro Days street dance in 1938 and featured bolero queen Chelo Silva before she blasted off to stardom. Vincent and brother Tito convinced Silva's parents to allow her to play at the kermess at Guadalupe Catholic Church and then to participate in the first Charro Days.

(The black-and-white photo above is said to be Vincent playing while Chelo looks on.)

That Vincent was also a radio talk show host in the early 1930s on station KGFI in Brownsville and is credited with dozens of compositions, among them "The Fiesta Charra" which was used as the Charro Days anthem for many years.

The Connectors and subsequent groups where Emilio plays specialize in the blues, a genre that came from the Black musicians just up the Gulf Coast. In a way, that old photo also conveys the evolution of music that is inclusive of all the people who have walked through Brownsville streets like his ancestors did.