‘Passion’ play

‘It’s time’ for final curtain on CATI performances

Some things you just don’t expect to ever change.

There are certain things you can’t say without expecting it to be followed by the other. Things like peanut butter and jelly, macaroni and cheese, Laurel and Hardy, Abbott and Costello, Rodgers and Hammerstein.

There are links that are forever forged. Things like John F. Kennedy and his “ask not what your country can do for you” call to arms, Martin Luther King Jr. and his “I have a dream” speech, Patrick Henry and his “give me liberty or give me death” resolve, and John Paul Jones and his “I regret that I have but one life to give for my country” speech.

But as the Greek philosopher Heraclitus observed, “change is the only constant.”

But how much change is too much?

What would the Fourth of July be without the Declaration of Independence?

What would Veterans Day be without knowing about the signing of the armistice?

And what would Come and Take It be without the history that is the very foundation of the struggle for Texas independence?

We’ll find out next year.

Gonzales historian Bob Burchard, the author and storyteller for the conversational-style historical recounting of Gonzales’ unique contributions to the birth of the Texas republic, says Saturday’s two performances of “Gonzales: The Beginning” will be the last for Come and Take It.

“There just comes a time when it is time for a change and a time for new volunteers to step forward and continue to tell the story of our town and our role in Texas history,” Burchard has decided, speaking on behalf of the four-person troupe that has performed the free 45-minute docudrama more than 200 times since 1999.

Burchard & Co. has presented the story not only each year at Come and Take It, but also at the Alamo, the Bob Bullock Texas State History Museum and a Daughters of the Republic of Texas chapter in Houston, as well as to bus-tour history buffs, for family reunions and “in every church fellowship hall in Gonzales.”

“All of us are volunteers,” Burchard says of himself and fellow participants Leon Netardus, Vicki Frenzel and Lois Willmann. “We do this, we spend the time with our performances because of our love and our passion for our community. We feel this is a productive way to tell the story of Gonzales and the involvement of our community in the fight for Texas freedom.”

But as the proverb says, all good things come to an end.

“It’s time for us to say, ‘This has been a good experience, and hope the public has enjoyed it, and hope people have learned from it.’ It’s just time,” Burchard laments.

“This is something for which we all had a passion, and something we all enjoyed doing. But it is time for the next group of people to come forward, if they wish, and to continue telling the story. Because there comes a time when it is appropriate for a change. I feel that time is now.”

The presentation, which takes its audience from the first settlers of the Green DeWitt Colony in 1825 through the events that culminated with the Runaway Scrape following the fall of the Alamo in 1836, was first performed at the Come and Take It celebration in 1999.

“I saw a presentation in a church in Austin in which someone interviewed the Apostle Paul, and basically, what was going on, and why did you write this?” Burchard says of his inspiration for the docudrama. “I thought, ‘we can do something like that in Gonzales.’ So I came back and started playing around with that thought.”

What developed is a tale of sacrifice blended with a passion for freedom that is the very foundation for why the defiant “Come and Take It” challenge has been commemorated the first weekend in October for the past 56 years.

“We do a good job of [telling] how we got started, what the issues where, what the motivations were as we headed toward San Jacinto. We speak briefly of the Battle at San Jacinto, but this is not a play about San Jacinto, it’s a play about Gonzales,” he says. “It’s been well received through the years. We’ve had people come up after the play and say ‘I’ve seen these types of things all over the country and this is the best one I’ve ever seen.’ That’s encouraging.

“We think it’s a good production or we wouldn’t have done it 200 times,” Burchard decides.

As if to ensure that his recounting of history is not lost, the fourth-generation Gonzales resident reiterates the message of the docudrama.

“It’s a good presentation of how Gonzales started, how Gonzales was founded, what was the motivation for people to come to Texas (in 1825) and come to Green DeWitt’s Colony, of which Gonzales is the capital,” Burchard explains, noting that the Green DeWitt Colony was the second most successful colonization contract in the history of the state, second only to the Stephen F. Austin Colony in San Felipe.

“Our play demonstrates the motivation for people to come to Texas, how Gonzales got started, how we got our name. Then we go into some of the elements that start to deal with leading up to the start of the Texas Revolution, which started here on Oct. 2, 1835, and the first shot. Then the issues that lead us to Gonzales sending men to the Alamo in response to Col. Travis’ letter asking for help – Gonzales was the only town to send aide to the Alamo. Then we conclude with the Runaway Scrape, which is what the historians call that period in our Texas history after the fall of the Alamo, leading up to San Jacinto,” Burchard recounts, lapsing into the storytelling character he has portrayed for the past 13 years.

“So Gonzales is the only town that may say, ‘This is where it started,’ ‘We’re the only town to send men to the Alamo’ and ‘This where Gen. Sam Houston initiated the Runaway Scrape.’ Sam Houston had been sent here after signing the declaration of independence at Washington on the Brazos on March 2nd,” he says. “Gonzales is unique for those three historical occurrences. No other town in the state may make those statements.”

Always the promoter of the history project for which he has become widely known, Burchard’s training in the seminary as an orator is apparent in his ability to paint a picture with words as well as his ability to draw his audiences into “the sacrifices that all Texans made in order to be free Texans today.”

Burchard says the play’s conversational style, rather than a stage play in which performers have parts and interact, “makes it a little easier to communicate and for the audience to receive it.”

As the storyteller, Burchard, bedecked in traditional 1800s-era Texas businessman attire, asks questions of Green DeWitt (played by Netardus), Martha McCoy (Willmann) and Margaret Darst (Frenzel). The characters’ answers portray life in early-day Gonzales and gives insight into the fears and dreams of the settlers who came to the frontier to start a life.

“Leon gets us started, gets us founded,” Burchard says, setting the stage. “Then Lois brings in the ‘why did people come to Green DeWitt’s Colony?’ and then Vicki is able to bring in those elements of the revolution and the Runaway Scrape. [Vicki’s character] is the epitome of sacrifice. Her husband (Jacob Darst) had fought here – one the Old Eighteen – defended the town as the word spread of a conflict here. He participated in the First Shot Battle, and then he was one of the 32 who died in the Alamo from Gonzales – actually 41 from Gonzales who died in the Alamo, nine were already there. Her character represents the personal sacrifice of losing family members. Then, at the same time of hearing the word of her husband’s death, she had to pick up a few things and run.”

As with everyday life, the play has its emotional ups and downs. “It has some humor in it, and a spot or two that someone could shed a tear,” Burchard says.

“It’s fun to do because it represents the passion of the story of Gonzales. It’s the beginning of three or four major themes in Texas history.”

Over the years, familiarity with the subject matter has not only given opportunity for taking liberties with the script, but also unintentional gaffes that only those in the play recognize.

“The funny thing about it is the other three characters accuse me of not following the script, which I will confess is probably true,” Burchard admits with a laugh. “From time to time I’ll have a thought that, ‘Well I wonder how they might answer this one?’ So I’ll put out something that I was thinking about, and they respond. Doing it that many times, we have dropped lines, forgotten to say something, so if I’m alert enough, I’ll go back and try to pick that up, because we want the audience to know these things about Gonzales.

“This is not a mystery that we’re doing here. This is an expression of who we are in Gonzales, because those events define our character, they are our heritage. And no other town in the state has that character and has that heritage, so it’s important for our audiences to know who we are,” he says.

So why not continue to educate Come and Take It audiences?

“The Come and Take It situation that day is back to back – a 12:30 show and then a 2 o’clock show. We’re delighted to do it, happy to be part of Come and Take It, but it’s a tough day. We’re all enjoying our majority, our maturation,” Burchard muses. “It’s time after a while to say, ‘all right, we did this, it’s good, it’s been well received …’ It’s time [to quit].”

Originally, the Come and Take It presentation was just one show, then three before settling on the current two-show schedule. So why not cut back to just one show during Come and Take It?

“[The three shows] just turned out to be a long day, so we cut back to two shows. Our current thinking now is that there should be multiple shows. Usually both performances are full. It needs to be multiple presentations. When we had the three [performances back in the early 1990s], we had big crowds at all three. It’s just a tough day for grownups to do that. We did three shows at the Alamo, and vowed we’d never do that again,” he says with an anguished laugh.

But the troupe is not actually hanging up its collective thespian attire, just the Come and Take It portion of it.

“While we view this as our final Come and Take It presentation, it’s not the end of the show,” Burchard assures. “We’re still open to bus tours and family reunions … We’re still available for that.”