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September FEATURES
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T HE R I V E R THAT START E D I T A LL
Native Americans and then Spanish settlers first landed in Bexar County because of the San Antonio River. The water has continued to act as the lifeblood of this South Texas community. Learn about the river’s history and about how you can take advantage of the vast recreation and cultural opportunities it offers today.
36 COURTESY VISIT SAN ANTONIO
A MOT HER’S M I SSI ON
When her daughter was killed in a mass shooting in Colorado, Boerne’s Sandy Anglin Phillips felt lost. In the eight years since, she's worked tirelessly to help the families of other gun violence victims process those same feelings.
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September D EPART M EN TS
10 URBAN EXPLAINER The City Council will vote on a budget this month under the constraints of a COVID-19 related shortfall and new demands from locals who want to see reform to police funding.
1 2 PERSON OF INTEREST Researcher and social worker Lily Casura on why women are being disproportionately impacted by the pandemic and what locals can do to help.
1 4 CULTU RE San Antonio’s fine arts companies had high hopes of
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hitting the stage this fall but instead are pivoting to digital content as they work to survive in the absence of live performances.
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5 8 TAST E M A K E R
If more time at home has left you itching for a refresh, one local interior designer is offering virtual services to create room “recipes.”
If you’ve ever indulged in dessert at Hot Joy or Barbaro, you have tasted the sweet work of pastry savant Jessica Philpot.
EAT + DRINK
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16 HEA LT H
57 L I BAT I O N S
Why one San Antonio ER doctor commits his free time to running a clinic that serves those without health insurance.
The latest creation from The Modernist relies on specialty tea and bourbon for a smoky fall flavor.
18 IN FLUEN CER The newest owner of Pinky’s Boutique is making some changes—including personal shopping via Instagram—but there’s still plenty of influence from the store’s founder.
A financial analyst by day, Arianna Stenson turned her love of tea into a successful side hustle, Flower Girl Apothecarie.
62 DISH PB & J with Tay delivers the ultimate twist on a childhood classic.
6 4 LO O K I N G BAC K Everett Fly continues uncovering pieces of Bexar County’s African American history.
ON THE COVER Witt Duncan captured the downtown skyline using a drone to shoot from above the San Antonio River just south of the city’s center.
BAKED GOODS, DRINK: JOMANDO CRUZ; KITCHEN: COURTESY STYLEBERRY CREATIVE
IN THE LOOP
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UP FRONT / EDITOR' S NOTEBOOK
onfession: I really like the River Walk— the Museum Reach, the Mission Reach, and yes, even the downtown reach. The touristy part. Walking by the colored umbrellas as barges of tours float by reminds me of the days when I was just a tourist here, enjoying the unique culture and vibe of San Antonio. Even if that CVB culture isn’t necessarily representative of the rest of the city, it’s still a part of San Antonio and one that’s beloved by millions of visitors each year (in non-pandemic times). Both north and south of the river’s cultural epicenter, the feeling the river evokes evolves—artistic, historical, natural—but the same water flows through, connecting these various personalities of the Alamo City. Native Americans first inhabited the area to be close to the natural resource, which they called Yanaguana, and when the Spanish arrived, they set up missions, forming the city, along the river they named after Saint Anthony. The water has been the lifeblood of civilization here since its origins, but many of us take it for granted today. We turn up our noses at its development or dismiss it for its diminutive size. Yet it’s still a major part of our city, from the impact of the tourism it drives on our economy to the river-adjacent projects that provide new ways to bring our community together—think San Pedro Creek Culture Park, the Tobin Center’s Will Naylor Smith River Walk Plaza and Confluence Park. Freelance writers Emily Guajardo and Claire Winesett present the “Ultimate Guide to the San Antonio River” on page 26 that will hopefully offer a new perspective on the past, present and future of our city’s namesake. It already has for me. As the summer brought scorching temperatures this July, my black lab, Finn, couldn’t handle long evening walks anymore so we began making daily trips to our neighborhood’s dog park or McAllister Park. One evening we decided to explore new scenery. With Finn in tow, my husband, Andrew, and I drove down to Blue Star, got to-go dessert from South Alamode Panini & Gelato and took a short stroll along the river. We walked south on the path below the street level and I let the native plants surround me and the town up above disappear. We hit the end of the path and turned back, and as we stepped along a crossing of large rocks to return to the Blue Star side of the river, I paused in the middle watching the water flow and appreciating its beauty and its impact—so much greater than it looks.
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BEHIND THE ISSUE It goes without saying that COVID-19 has affected every facet of our lives, including the way we produce art for our publication. When planning our profile on Sandy Anglin Phillips, we found out that she and her husband were quarantining out of town. This made getting photos for this feature difficult. However, much like we’ve all done with other aspects of this pandemic, we turned to technology and creativity to solve our problem. Longtime contributing photographer Josh Huskin connected with Sandy and Lonnie Phillips over Zoom and directed them on which locations of their house would work best based on lighting. He then helped Lonnie to photograph Sandy using his phone’s camera. Once we had the phone pictures, I worked with Josh to create a photo collage that would allow us to not only achieve a better-quality photo for print but also attempt to visually express the feature through the opening photo. —DAVID G. LOYOLA, ART DIRECTOR
COMING NEXT MONTH Experience the ultimate social distancing. We’ll tell you the best places to get outdoors to escape—near and far.
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CORD: VINCENT GONZALEZ; PHILLIPS: JOSH HUSKIN
Rebecca Fontenot Cord Publisher & Editor in Chief
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SEPTEMBER 2020 / VOLUME 15 / ISSUE 10 WHAT’S YOUR FAVORITE THING ABOUT THE SAN ANTONIO RIVER?
Rebecca Fontenot Cord PUBL IS HER & EDITOR IN CHIE F
EDITOR IAL EXECUTIVE EDITOR
Kathleen Petty CONTRIBUTING WRITERS
Jade Esteban Estrada, Emily Guajardo, Sarah Martinez, Katherine Stinson, Edmund Tijerina, Claire Winesett FACT CHECKER
Katherine Stinson “This fun fact: In the years after the railroad arrived in San Antonio, guests at the Menger Hotel enjoyed its famous snapper soup, made from turtles caught in the San Antonio River. (Snapping turtles, not red snapper.)”
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Julie A. Kunkle EDITORIAL DIRECTOR
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Hollis Boice AUDIENCE DEVELOPMENT DIRECTOR
EDITORIAL INTERN
Alex Fulton
Kerri Nolan ACCO UN T IN G
ART & PRODUCTION ART DIRECTOR
David G. Loyola GRAPHIC DESIGNER & PRODUCTION MANAGER
David Hassmann PHOTO ASSISTANT
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“Jogging along the Mission Reach part of the San Antonio River and seeing all of the art sculptures along the river.”
DIGITAL MEDIA COORDINATOR
Rosie Ninesling
Brenda Piña CO NTACT US CONTRIBUTING ILLUSTRATOR
Vicente Martí CONTRIBUTING PHOTOGRAPHERS
JoMando Cruz, Witt Duncan, Josh Huskin ADV ERTIS ING ASSOCIATE PUBLISHER
“Kayaking with my daughter.”
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© Copyright: San Antonio Magazine is published by Open Sky Media, Inc. The entire document of San Antonio Magazine is © 2020 by Open Sky Media, Inc. No portion may be reproduced in whole or in part by any means, including electronic retrieval systems, without the express written permission of the publisher. Opinions expressed in this magazine are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of ownership or management. Editorial or advertising does not constitute advice but is considered informative. San Antonio Magazine is locally operated.
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In the Loop I N SI D E / HOW F INE A RTS WIL L SU RVIVE p. 14 / A COMMUN ITY C LIN IC IAN . p. 16 / VIRTUAL H OME D ES I GN p . 2 0
Purposeful Art hen Eddie Romero at Centro San Antonio contacted artist Isabel Ann Castro this summer about creating some posters for display downtown that encouraged proper mask wearing and other public health protocols, Castro was hesitant. She wasn’t interested in drawing a corporate or “whitewashed” image of San Antonio. Then she was in a local thrift store and noticed how many customers either weren’t wearing masks correctly or weren’t wearing them at all. She thought of the owner of her favorite record shop, Janie Esparza, who is older, which Castro knew means she’s at higher risk of COVID-19. “These are people who have lived San Antonio history and culture and all this knowledge and stories,” she says, of Esparza and other business owners. “I’m totally afraid that they’re going to die during COVID because people won’t wear masks.” She called Romero and took the job. He had suggestions for topics but gave her free reign to make the posters reflect her San Antonio community. One depicts two Latino men wearing masks (and matching guayaberas) playing guitars while social distancing outside of Mi Tierra. Another shows a Black mom and daughter and another depicts an older gentleman wearing a mask outside of Penner’s. Castro says it was important to her that the posters include both English and Spanish because English is not every San Antonian’s first language, and the virus has disproportionately impacted Latinos (in Bexar County, 74 percent of local cases through July had occurred among Latino residents). All of the copy and translations for the posters were done by Castro’s best friend, registered nurse and poet Natasha Hernandez. Castro says she’s hopeful the posters, which were put up on social media, in storefronts and displayed during Centro’s mask distribution events, can help save a life. “I hope that people see my work and recognize themselves in it and take heed and protect themselves and their families and their community.”—ALEX FULTON
ILLUSTRATION BY ISABEL ANN CASTRO; PHONE: BUSINESS STOCK/SHUTTERSTOCK.COM
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IN THE LOOP / URBAN EXPLAINER
The City Budget Explainer How the City of San Antonio decides how to allocate more than $2 billion and how police reform and public health are weighing on this year’s discussions BY JADE ESTEBAN ESTRADA ach fall, the City of San Antonio adopts a budget for the next fiscal year, which runs from Oct. 1 through Sept. 30. While community input is always sought, this year there are more eyes than usual on the city as it must address public health needs, shortfalls due to COVID-19, and calls for police defunding. District 4 City Councilwoman Adriana Rocha Garcia, Ph.D., provides some insight into what the process looks like and which areas she proposes to focus on.
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Community Need The council members each advocate for what services they believe are most important for their districts. Out of the hundreds of city services, there are some daily services Rocha Garcia believes residents can’t live without. She compares her prioritization process to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. For her Southwest district, the top three requests from residents are utility or rental assistance, code compliance and police. “They want to feel safe,” she says. She adds that this year’s process is also impacted significantly by the pandemic and that the council will likely have to continue reassessing, shifting priorities and staying flexible
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enough to meet unexpected needs. “This year’s budget process is unique because we are simultaneously addressing the effects of a public health emergency with an understanding that our public health department was severely underfunded prior to the pandemic and that our residents will need a myriad of support through social service programs,” she says. Community Feedback Through virtual town halls, phone calls, emails and social media, Rocha Garcia and other council members can analyze the rich resource of community input. City spokesperson Laura Mayes says the city has seen higher community engagement in their virtual sessions this year and that all of those opinions are taken into account. This year, over 20,000 residents participated in a budget survey that asks them to prioritize what they think is most important, whether parks, libraries, streets, police or some other area. Prioritization After accessing the community needs and gathering input from residents, the council prioritizes where the budget’s funding will be directed to have the maximum effect.
ILLUSTRATION BY DAVID G. LOYOLA
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Following the death of George Floyd and the Black Lives Matter protests in San Antonio (and elsewhere), Rocha Garcia sees an opportunity to reassess what policing looks like. “I think that we need to shift some money from the police over to a different department. In my opinion, we need to address the roots of our problems,” she says. “We should be investing in programs that help with awareness with mental health (and we should) invest a little bit more on social workers.” At present, public safety—which is shared between the fire and police departments— accounts for over 60 percent of the general fund. “Public safety takes $820.3 million,” she says. “I think we need to reinvest, redirect and reprioritize.” Of course, a majority of council members would have to agree with her for there to be a redistribution of funds. Goal Setting On June 26, the council engaged in a goal-setting session that left it with a handful of priorities that the majority of the council agreed need to be addressed. Among those was the goal to develop a long-term plan for police services that also focuses on social services rather than relying solely on police response. The majority also agreed public health will require continued investment and that they support endorsing a $10 million contribution
to VIA over the next five years, with flexibility for more route frequency in fiscal year 2021. Budget Proposal On Aug. 6, the city manager presented the proposed operating and capital budget to the City Council. “This is when we see where we are and see if any priorities that we brought up were included or not,” Rocha Garcia says. Council members then review the budget and offer feedback through budget sessions which extend through Sept. 16. The council will also hold two community input sessions, on Sept. 2 and 10, where locals can provide feedback. The city has said it anticipates a budget shortfall of over $100 million, which Rocha Garcia says will require some “cost-saving solutions” that could include things like postponing large capital projects, delaying some public works projects and tightening department budgets.
FOUR THINGS TO C H AT A BO UT AS YOU WELCOME T H OSE FA LL T EM PS
SAHCC Leader / After a six-month search, Marina Gonzales was selected as president and CEO at the San Antonio Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. Gonzales is a first-generation college and law school graduate who has served as president and CEO of the nonprofit Child Advocates San Antonio and as an executive with CentroMed.
Adopting the Budget The council will adopt a budget on Sept. 17. The city’s charter states that the council must adopt a balanced budget prior to the start of the fiscal year. “The current economic situation is affecting cities across our country so, realistically, there will be some adjustments across departments to best meet our current needs and fit within projected revenue forecasts,” she says.
Five Minutes with Young Ambitious Activists TORRY SLEDGE, LEXI QAIYYIM AND VALERIE REIFFERT ON WORKING FOR CHANGE
COURTESY SAN ANTONIO HISPANIC CHAMBER OF COMMERCE
How did Young Ambitious Activists come about? TS: Most people see us as a Black Lives Matter group because we were created out of the Black Lives Matter movement for George Floyd, but we are activists for all of San Antonio. It’s not just about police brutality. It’s about equity, education, accessibility to services, health and wellness, economic development. Segregation that started back in the 1900s in San Antonio lead to inequality in our education system that still exists today. We’re focused on changing those type of systemic problems. It’s not just a Black or Latinx or white organization. It’s all encompassing and is really meant to show what San Antonio is about. LQ: We all met each other at the protests for George Floyd and talked about the kind of changes that we want to see in our community.
Since the first George Floyd protest, you all have hosted vigils for Garrett Foster, Vanessa Guillen and others as well as protesting racism that occurred among Alamo Heights ISD students and elsewhere. How do you decide when to speak out? VR: I think it’s the pulse of what’s going on in the community. It’s very unfortunate that it started with George Floyd and Breonna Taylor and then we’ve had more incidents. We want to keep up with what’s going on and make others aware of how they can make a difference. TS: We have also hosted community cleanups and food drives and we’ve volunteered to serve the homeless and others. We’re working with the city to start education programs, things like supplemental tutoring, which will be so important as students go back to distance learning in a city where one in
four don’t have easy access to Internet. We’re also looking at voter drives and other things. VR: I went out to the protests on June 1 by myself and started thinking about ways we could make a bigger impact. I thought someone should be registering people to vote so I became deputized and then found other volunteers and we’ve created a subgroup, The Radical Registrars. Since May 31 (through late July), we’ve registered over 500 people and we’re also recruiting poll workers since the average age of an election judge here is 72, so they’re at higher risk. We need young people to step up. We’re going to keep this momentum up. We’re not planning on stopping anytime soon because lives are literally at stake. We want to see real changes, so my child and their children don’t have to deal with the mess we’ve dealt with. youngambitiousactivists.com
Parallels to War / Dr. Robert A. De Lorenzo, professor and research director in the Department of Emergency Medicine at UT Health San Antonio, is leading a team of researchers to develop a more modern breathing tube that could be used with patients suffering respiratory failure, like many COVID-19 patients. De Lorenzo says he first realized the need for better airway devices while serving as an Army doctor in Iraq. During COVID-19, he’s found that intubation has drawbacks and he hopes a more modern option could be safer for patients and caregivers. Work From Home Life / A portion of both USAA employees and City of San Antonio employees were notified over the summer that they can expect to log their hours from home through the end of 2020. Homicide Spike / While the rate of theft and other crimes is on the decline, San Antonio was among the large cities reporting an increased homicide rate during the late spring and summer months. In the Alamo City, there were 43 homicides between the start of the pandemic in mid-March and the end of June, up from 30 during that time period in 2019.
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IN THE LOOP / PERSON OF INTEREST
during various research projects that while oneon-one client interaction was vital, her passion lay elsewhere, with data and survey work that could help to drive broader change, whether in domestic violence services or policy around wage equity. “I love to look at a topic overall and the research and have that influence policy.” Casura says. “You can help more people at once.” In the coming months, she’ll begin working with the University of Texas at San Antonio on a COVID-19-related community survey on domestic violence. You’ve pointed to national data that shows women and persons of color are being impacted unequally by COVID-19. What does that mean for San Antonio? Part of the takeaway for me from “The Status of Women” (2019 report) was that when we compared ourselves to the other three big cities in Texas, we were the worst, whether it was domestic violence, income, education attainment, whatever it was. Part of that we can understand because there are more higher earning opportunities in Austin, Houston and Dallas. Here we’re still overly concentrated in hospitality and service. At UTSA, when we looked at the national data on frontline workers (people in hospitality, health care and other essential jobs), it was depressing to realize that if you’re a person of color, especially if you’re a woman, you’re more likely to be earning less than $30,000 annually. The median hourly wage for the 54 percent of frontline workers who make less than $30,000 is about $10 an hour. Plus, you’re more likely to be uninsured. Women in that group are likely to have an even lower median income than men, with Hispanic women in frontline jobs reporting a median income of less than $20,000. I wish we could have localized that data, but we know that a lot of those lower-paying frontline jobs exist in San Antonio.
Lily Casura Social worker and researcher wants local officials to pay attention to the impact of COVID-19 on women and domestic violence INTERVIEW BY KATHLEEN PETTY hen Lily Casura started looking at national data concerning frontline workers, it was clear the burden of COVID-19 was falling unevenly on people of color, particularly women. And while San Antonio–specific data hadn’t been collected, Casura knew from the work she and Rogelio Sáenz, Ph.D., did on the 2019 “Status of Women in San Antonio” report that a large percentage of low-earning hospitality workers in the city meant the pandemic was likely having an even greater impact locally. “What are we doing to help them?” asks Casura, who uses her master’s in social work to conduct research on women’s and veterans’ issues. “I doubt it’s a whole lot because we’ve likely never really stopped to think about how many there are.” Originally a journalist, Casura says it was her interest in veterans issues like PTSD that led her back to graduate school. She had the goal of helping people work through trauma and found
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FACT FILE Years in San Antonio: 9 Education: Harvard, UTSA Research focus: Female veteran homelessness, domestic violence, poverty and wage equity
What should be done with that knowledge? In San Antonio’s last Comprehensive Community Needs Assessment, which surveys low income residents and nonprofits every three years, one of the conclusions was that people don’t know what services are out there. So, we need to build a better network and have navigators who can help connect people to services. Transportation and childcare are big issues here, so if someone is working multiple jobs and they don’t have a car or childcare to get to the agency that can help them, they’re not going to get help. We need to start decentralizing stuff. There’s this concept called an occupational structure, which is a staircase of what levels of jobs are available in a certain locale. Here, ours is too concentrated on those lower paying hospitality and food service jobs. It doesn’t mean we pay less in those industries than other cities, just that
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those jobs aren’t well paying to begin with and there aren’t as many opportunities in industries that allow people to move up. We need to diversify. My fear is once this is over, people will snap back and say, ‘Let’s get the economy roaring again’ without addressing what we’ve seen with how we treat low wage working women of color. If we don’t change that now, how is it going to be different when the next disaster occurs? We need more occupations that pay a living wage and more ways for people to access them. There are programs—Project Quest and Training for Job Success, which is federally funded—but we need more opportunities and we need to connect people to those training programs and make sure there are jobs when they finish. You also research domestic violence in San Antonio. How has COVID-19 impacted that? It has increased because of the pandemic—not just here but everywhere. The U.N. estimates there has been a 20 percent increase worldwide. Of all of the things in the “Status of Women in San Antonio” report, domestic violence was the thing that got the City Council’s attention the most, that San Antonio had higher rates of domestic violence, so work had begun to address and decrease domestic violence in San Antonio. Unfortunately, we hadn’t made enough headway before the pandemic hit. It looked like we could do amazing things and then the pandemic hit. Now, compared to health and the economy, I don’t know that people have the bandwidth for this issue. And you’re involved in a research project about this topic? UTSA is going to do a big community survey on domestic violence with part of the COVID CARES Act funds the city received, and I’ll be involved with working on that survey. There has never been a comprehensive survey of San Antonio about domestic violence. This will partly focus on COVID implications—did it get worse, which we know it did, but how much?—but also it will be just about what people’s experiences are of the system. Because if people reach out for help once and they don’t feel like they got help or they feel they were discriminated against, maybe the next time they won’t call back. It’s also learning about whether people know where to reach out and where to go if they do need help. It’s super-exciting to work on this because it was clear when we did the “Status of Women in San Antonio” report that it’s tough to get accurate data on domestic violence. I hope the data can help guide the need for services. There is already a domestic violence task force out there, and a city-county commission on domestic violence, but this survey will give a better idea of how widespread the problem is, who reaches out for help, what their experiences of help are like, and what the gaps in services are. In the report on women, you also noted a lack of female representation on the City Council and in leadership. Now, women represent more than half of the city’s council districts. Does that help? I am hopeful that with female leaders in place, some of this stuff will get attention. For women, this stuff isn’t abstract. They have lived it or they have family members who have lived it so it’s not academic to them. In Boston and California, for example, there are laws requiring wage equity. Boston has a whole office in the mayor’s office about the advancement of women and California has an office dedicated to equity. You can teach women to negotiate for higher salaries but without a law compelling people to pay attention, it’s tough to fix. If you look around the world, data shows that the countries that did the best against COVID-19 had women leaders so I think we’re very lucky to have so many women on the City Council now. Maybe more will happen on these crucial issues.
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Can Performing Arts Survive? How local companies are staying relevant even when they can’t be on stage BY KATHLEEN PETTY
pera San Antonio won’t take the Tobin Center for the Performing Arts stage again until May 6 and 8 but that doesn’t mean they’re going dark for the remainder of the year. Instead, the company is rolling out an online master class in collaboration with Fort Worth Opera, offering an “Explore Opera for Kids” online series, hosting digital artist interviews and holding “Cocktails & Conversation” Zoom sessions with donors, says E. Loren Meeker, general and artistic director. “This is incredibly new territory for the arts across the globe,” Meeker says. “Our focus is presenting grand opera, and at the moment, that is an extremely difficult art form to produce with the health and safety guidelines for singing. That presents the challenge of, how do we continue to stay relevant and engaged?” Meeker is not alone in shifting plans and getting creative as increasing COVID-19 cases in San Antonio forced the
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cancellation of the majority of fall arts performances. After announcing a 2020-21 season that would start with Don Quixote in October, Ballet San Antonio had to change plans in July knowing it would not be able to safely start the necessary rehearsals this summer. As of press time, it planned to open with The Nutcracker in December, followed by Cinderella in February but CEO Evin Eubanks admits everything in the midst of a pandemic is tentative. “It’s certainly a challenging time for us all,” Eubanks says, adding that they were grateful to receive a PPP loan as well as some grants to help sustain them. “The next few months will really define how we live through this pandemic … We know we’re not alone in the struggle and we don’t put ourselves ahead of health care and job losses.” To stay engaged, the company launched its school in late July with a virtual intensive for ballet students and Eubanks
BALLET SA: DAVID TERAN; OPERA SA: KAREN ALMOND PHOTOGRAPHY; SA SYMPHONY: JOSH HUSKIN; TOBIN CENTER: MARK MENJIVAR; CORONAVIRUS: SHUTTERSTOCK.COM/BRASTOCK
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says company dancers are training remotely as much as is possible. They’re also looking at other virtual options to pursue. The San Antonio Symphony was the last of the three major local companies to shift its plans, canceling in late July all planned performances through Jan. 31, 2021. They’d initially hoped to open the year on Sept. 25-26 at the Tobin Center. Five full-time administrative employees also were furloughed over the summer. “We conducted a patron survey in early July which showed that less than 30 percent of our audience is comfortable with returning to live concerts this fall,” Executive Director Cory Cowart says. Many musicians already have offered virtual performances and online collaborations, but Cowart says they’re continuing to assess what smaller-scale offerings they might be able to present in the fall. Michael Fresher, president and CEO of the Tobin Center, says they surveyed patrons earlier in the summer and found people age 35-50 were eager to return to the theater. The Tobin Center hosted a few events in June at 20 percent capacity—something it’s able to easily enforce because the ground floor is built to allow for them to place only the number of seats out that they want to sell. “People can’t wait to get back to the Tobin,” he says. “It’s just a matter of when.” Instead of canceling full swaths of its season, the Tobin Center has worked to reschedule dates as needed on a rolling basis with the idea that it wants to present live arts as soon as it can, even if to a limited audience. “We’re a nonprofit. We cannot afford to miss an opportunity,” he says, adding that they already had to furlough close to 80 percent of their staff this spring. The Tobin Center applied for a grant through the city, and Fresher said they also are working with national touring acts to negotiate fees based on the number of people they’ll be able to host inside of the theater when it does welcome guests. With Broadway closed through at least the end of the year, Broadway in San Antonio had to cancel or reschedule its 2020 dates at the Majestic Theatre. In early August, the Majestic & Empire Theatres had no plans to reopen yet, but general manager Emily Smith says they continue working with tours to schedule something as soon as it’s safe. “We will share reopening details as soon as they become clearer,” Smith says. Eubanks and Meeker say their companies are working to embrace the present challenges and that they’ve been encouraged locals have continued to engage with them, even if just through social media. Some patrons have donated the cost of tickets purchased to performances that were canceled, and company leaders say they have a core of supportive donors. But they all acknowledge that there’s a lot of need in the community right now. “I understand that for a lot of philanthropists right now it’s about feeding people and keeping people safe,” Fresher says. “We’re not tone deaf to the fact that while we understand that arts is critical to the community and critical to the culture, there are a lot of needs right now.” The city suspended its arts grants and funding in April but in July announced a $2.6 million SA CARES 4 Art emergency fund for which many local companies, visual artists and others applied. Eubanks says they remain hopeful and committed to surviving— not just so San Antonians can enjoy live performance but also so that local artists can continue to be a part of what defines the Alamo City’s culture. “Arts organizations are part of the fabric of our community,” Eubanks says. “Arts organizations are a large contributor to the San Antonio economy and it would be a major loss (not to have them). We want to make sure that we continue to be a part of the conversation and that we will be here for the community on the other side of the pandemic.”
READING THE NOTES NATIONAL ENDOWMENT FOR THE ARTS GRANT ALLOWS SA SYMPHONY TO TEST ITS THEORY THAT LIVE MUSIC PAIRED WITH CURRICULUM LEADS TO IMPROVED LITERACY SKILLS Before fourth grade students ever virtually watch the San Antonio Symphony perform A Midsummer Night’s Dream, they will have read through the Shakespeare play, written a theater review and applied a phases of the moon astronomy lesson to a scene about the night sky. It’s all part of the Young People’s Concert program and the accompanying curriculum by QWILL (Quality Writing Inspires Lifelong Learning) that teachers have access to throughout the year. Designed to align with state standards, the semester-long cross-curricular lessons are meant to not only enhance a student’s experience watching the symphony but also lead to improved academic outcomes and higher social-emotional learning. “The more cross-curricular connections you can make, the deeper impact you can have on students,” says Jeremy Brimhall, director of education for the San Antonio Symphony. The curriculum is available to any teacher and targeted at third through fifth graders. This year, thanks to a $17,500 grant from the National Endowment for the Arts, around 50 fourth grade classrooms in San Antonio will have free access to the QWILL curriculum plus professional development to help implement it into their semester. As their students complete the lessons and then virtually watch the symphony and Children’s Ballet of San Antonio perform A Midsummer Night’s Dream, the symphony and a nationally recognized education researcher will study through test scores whether the program has improved language arts outcomes and social-emotional learning skills for participating students. Brimhall says national studies already show that just taking a field trip to a live symphony can positively impact literacy while participating in music at school can enhance language arts skills across the board. If a student is immersed in a curriculum related to the performance, Brimhall and QWILL co-developer Andrew Lester hope that data shows the impact is even greater. ‘If the theory works, then it will give fine arts directors another arrow in their quiver to go out and say how important the arts are,” Lester says. To create this year’s performance during COVID-19, the symphony played for an empty auditorium and recorded the show for use by teachers throughout South Texas. Typically, the symphony presents around 30 Young People’s Concerts annually, both at the Tobin Center and in school auditoriums. Brimhall says while he’s confident music has a positive impact on student learning, he also knows that just exposing kids to classical music at a young age is important. “For a lot of the students who come to our Young People’s Concerts, it’s their very first interaction with symphonic music, and sometimes even classical music. Unfortunately, it’s also sometimes their last experience,” he says. “I take it very seriously that we have sort of one shot to get them really engaged.”—KP
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The Do-Good Doctor South Side physician Ray Altamirano dedicates all his free time to helping low-income and uninsured patients get the medical care they need BY SARAH MARTINEZ s a product of the South Side, Dr. Ray Altamirano knows money can be tight for some San Antonio families. While practicing as a family care doctor he began noticing that many of his patients weren’t taking care of their health due to expensive medical bills. Dismayed, he eventually left family medicine. But he didn’t turn his back on those patients. Instead, he set out to disrupt the healthcare industry. Today, Altamirano’s “job” is that of an emergency room doctor at freestanding ERs, but his passion is the South Side clinic he founded in March 2019: Casa Salud Family Medicine Clinic, where he practices a direct-care model that cuts out insurance companies. Many of his 500 patients work blue collar jobs, moved to the U.S. from Mexico, and only speak Spanish. They cannot afford high medical bills, so he offers services for a flat $100 fee, which includes basic lab work, if needed. Altamirano wants Casa Salud to be an affordable solution for low-income and uninsured people—a demographic that’s growing with furloughs and layoffs due to COVID-19. Due to the severity of the pandemic, Altamirano closed his clinic from March through June, but did not give up on those who needed help the most. Though he wasn’t seeing patients in person, he kept a direct line of communication with dozens of them to make sure they stayed healthy. Some of these calls were “crisis situations,” in which his patients were experiencing panic attacks and increased stress, leading to high blood pressure. Other patients completed telemedicine visits, though Altamirano says many Casa Salud patients don’t have access to do that. “There’s a lot of that demographic that is not tied into technology,” he says. “They’re laborers, they’re construction workers. They have a flip phone.” Altamirano works to find solutions that provide care to any person in need of it. He paints and
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sells his prints to help fund care for some patients who can’t afford it, and was even featured on The Doctors and Kelly Clarkson’s show for his work, which he says helped boost fundraising efforts. Recently, he teamed up with lawyer Desi Martinez, who covered lab work for 10 patients through a sponsorship, and Altamirano is working to find others interested in providing scholarships. “We want to invite more small businesses,” he says. “If they want to invest in the community, we want to be that vessel.” He found inspiration anew this spring from the owners of Folklores Coffee House, who delivered meals to community members in need while their coffee shop was closed. “When I see other leaders that are putting their own business at risk to do something like that, it motivates me to do a little more,” Altamirano says. “It’s OK to put your own business or money on the back burner and do what’s right up front.” While Altamirano doesn’t offer COVID-19 testing in his clinic, he has provided care through telemedicine to the 30 or more of his patients who have had the virus at one point. Even with the chaos of the pandemic, the clinic’s mission is as strong as ever. Altamirano is also hoping to inspire a new generation of medical professionals to practice cost-conscious medicine. He’s partnering with the University of the Incarnate Word School of Osteopathic Medicine to teach about the relationship between medicine and business and he has recruited student nurse practitioners to work alongside him at the clinic, allowing them to not only learn about diagnostics and treatments, but also the cost of healthcare and how that impacts patients. Though he’s committed to his work in the emergency room, he’d eventually like to focus all of his time on Casa Salud. He says it would take at least $5,000 in annual sponsorships in order to make his mission financially sustainable, but that’s a goal he’s dedicated to reaching. “When I’m in the clinic, it doesn’t feel like a job,” Altamirano says. “We didn’t start this clinic as a business, but as a service. It just feels like the right thing to do.”
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A Golden Touch The latest owner of Pinky’s Boutique refreshed the shop while honoring its legacy BY BONNY OSTERHAGE inky’s Boutique is a rare gem that is sparkling even more brightly thanks to a recent facelift from new owner Jill Golden. “I wanted to continue to please the existing customers while adding to what we offered,” Golden says. “I’ve brought in new lines that appeal to a wider customer base and included more modern accessories and premium denim brands.” She also redesigned the 600-square-foot space to better showcase the merchandise and create what she describes as a “light and airy feel.” Drawing on her own visual merchandising expertise, Golden worked with SA’s She and Him Designs to pull her idea and vision together. “I wanted the clothing to take center stage,” she says. Originally from Beaumont, Golden’s passion for fashion was ignited when she stepped foot into the Houston Galleria for the first time at age 7. “I was blown away,” she recalls. “I knew then that I wanted to do something in this industry.” She earned a fashion merchandising degree from Lamar University and built an impressive career as the retail merchandising rep for Perry Ellis menswear. Golden moved to San Antonio in 2007 with her husband Joe and two children. When the opportunity surfaced to purchase Pinky’s from founder Mary “Pinky” Towner in 2018, Golden was excited to put her two decades of retail experience to work at the well-established community boutique. Still, she says, the COVID-19 pandemic brought new meaning to customer service as Golden used social media to provide personal shopping to customers via Instagram messages until she was able to reopen the doors in May. Since then, she’s tried to strike a balance between the old and new. “I want to be able to take what Pinky built based on her key concept of one-on-one attention and strike a balance with the technology part to offer customers a way to shop from home but with that personal touch,” she says. And even though she is officially retired, you can still find Pinky behind the counter at the shop that bears her name. “Pinky loves her customers so much and she is still very involved here,” Golden says. “I wouldn’t have it any other way.”
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Styleberry Creative Interiors gives clients the option to spruce up their home without ever having a designer walk inside BY KATHLEEN PETTY
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nterior designer Shawna Percival may not be able to visit every client’s home to measure the floor space in need of a rug or the kitchen wall where floating shelves are planned but that doesn’t mean she can’t provide a solution. The founder of Styleberry Creative Interiors began offering virtual interior design consulting this spring and now has a six-week waiting list of clients who want help to refresh their living room, redesign the kitchen where they’re suddenly cooking each night or transform their master bathroom. Meeting with clients via video chat had long been something Percival resisted. The hands-on aspect of interior design was what made her fall in love with the field and she couldn’t see losing that. But then COVID-19 hit and Percival’s firm lost a significant amount of its revenue due to canceled projects. “We had to pivot to figure out how we would stay afloat,” she says, adding that they also continue to offer their typical full-service design services for those who desire that.
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Opposite page: A family game room Styleberry Creative Interiors designed in San Antonio. The clients used the firm's drawing as a guide to create their own gallery wall. This page, from top: Living room redesigns can include a complete overhaul or a refresh of smaller areas, like shelving spaces; Gallery wall designs can be completed through a virtual strategy session; Shawna Percival.
3 Tips for Investing in Home Décor 1. Have a Plan When you know what your end goal is, you won’t buy anything that you don’t need. Whether your plan is a mood board you create or a detailed drawing a professional delivers, it’s a necessary first step for creating shopping lists. Percival says often people pick up accessories based on what they like at the store, which means they’re not taking into account the room’s full aesthetic or the size that a lamp, vase, rug or frame should be based on the space it will live in. “People misunderstand how important scale is and usually go too small,” she says. 2. Invest in the Places Where You Sit and Sleep Since most people have kids or pets, Percival says materials matter and she typically advises clients to invest in the places where they spend the most time—couches, chairs and beds. A couch may be beautiful but if it’s not comfortable, you won’t love it. If pieces are well made and upholstered with performance fabric, they’ll not only offer comfort but also last longer. 3. Get Creative in Accessories Percival says she’s found some of her greatest shelf décor items at estate sales but that she also loves places like Target and Homegoods. When it comes to styling shelves, she encourages people to search #shelfie on Instagram for inspiration. “It’s the way you put things together that creates the magic,” she says. “It’s not the actual thing.” On couches and beds, Percival likes to take a high/low approach, investing in a few pillows with designs or fabrics she loves and then layering them in front of solid colored, budget-friendly pillows.
She added a virtual room design service as well as a less-involved virtual design strategy session to her array of services and says they’ve connected with a whole new client base. “I realized there’s a whole group of people who are looking to work with a designer but may want to take on some of the project themselves,” Percival says. “We created a system to give them the recipe and the confidence to pull together our design on their own.” In the virtual room design service, Percival and her team treat it like a regular project, except for that they may never meet their client in-person or set foot in the space. They chat over Zoom calls, have their client send over the exact measurements of their rooms, shelving and other spaces and then she and her three-person team send full renderings, measurements, a shopping list and technical drawings for the client to implement. Before the project ever begins, they also have clients fill out an extensive questionnaire about their goals, style preferences and other design dreams. The virtual service is performed at a flat fee and is more affordable than a full-service project because the client is charged with ordering many of the new furnishing or décor items. For those who just want help styling a shelf or adding a gallery wall to their living room, Percival offers virtual strategy sessions—something many outside of San Antonio have taken her up on. In recent months, Percival also has given clients the option of scheduling their last meeting at the local KBK to the Trade showroom so they can sit on couches or chairs and touch different fabrics before making their final decisions. If a project requires construction, Percival says the drawings and measurements they provide can guide a contractor to implement their exact vision. If you’re going to be at home, she says, it should be a place you love. “People are home, they’re learning what they do and don’t like about their house and they’re ready to change,” Percival says.
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St. Mary’s University Founded in 1852, St. Mary’s is the oldest Catholic university in Texas. Academic achievement, community and holistic learning are what sets a St. Mary’s education apart. For many graduates, their St. Mary’s experience is a defining moment in their lives, sparking a passion for life-long learning and servant leadership. One Camino Santa Maria San Antonio, TX 78228 210-436-3011 stmarytx.edu
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WATER CONTINUES TO ACT AS THE CENTER OF THE COMMUNITY, BOTH AS A DRIVER OF ECONOMIC ACTIVITY AND AS A PLACE TO ENJOY CULTURE AND NATURAL BEAUTY
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RUNNING THROUGH
While its identity goes far beyond the iconic shot of colorful umbrellas lining the downtown River Walk, its history, literature, art, events and even its heritage as a culinary center are all tied to the water. Restaurants and distilleries like Cured at Pearl and Ranger Creek Brewing & Distilling use mesquite (Ranger Creek in its Texas Rimfire whiskey) as a nod to the trees that grow along the river. Others, like Maria Mia Mexican Bistro, use it as inspiration for menu names, like the sweet and sour River Rita. While some of the river-inspired culture spawns from its resources and aesthetic, others use it as inspiration in their art or writing, including former San Antonio poet laureate Carmen Tafolla in her book This River Here: Poems of San Antonio. Say Sí, a nonprofit creative youth development program, has helped students write the river into their plays and poems such as Napako: Our Journey, a play about San Antonio’s indigenous history that looks specifically at the Blue Hole as an important practical and spiritual place. San Antonio River Foundation Executive
Director Frates Seeligson says the art on the river has forced people to have a conversation about the city, art and the river itself. Public art pieces like “F.I.S.H.,” “Whispers” and “Árbol De La Vida Memorias Y Voces De La Tierra” have interpreted the river’s beauty and complexity in very different ways; all of which are equally important to the community. “Art is in the eye of the beholder,” Seeligson says. “When we started working with partners, we wanted to find a way to attract people to the river, effect change and not cause financial distress; the answer was art. The San Antonio community is so strong and colorful and its members are very expressive.” He adds that the river also is part of what drives San Antonio’s sense of community. “San Antonio is a friendly city. That’s our nature,” he says. “We have seen people going up and down along the river and strangers waving to strangers. They come to see art and nature and begin to see the beauty of the city and river in their own way. Our mission has always been to promote the river through arts and culture and education, and everything we strive to do is to reconnect people to the river. What brings people to San Antonio is the river and that’s their story.”
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San Antonio is inextricably tied to its river.
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28 WAYS TO ENJOY THE RIVER
Paddle the Stream While the only way to take a ride on the river in its most famous section downtown is on a river barge, several other areas of the water are open for kayaking, including as the river flows south beyond the city limits, toward the Gulf of Mexico, eventually feeding into the Guadalupe River west of Port Lavaca, near the San Antonio Bay. Try out one of these paddling trails to see the river from a new perspective.
Cycle the Trails
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Start amid the bustle of downtown near Main Plaza or hop on the trail at the Blue Star Arts Complex and follow the Mission Reach trail for close to 10 miles each way, planning stops at four of San Antonio’s five historic missions along the ride. Each mission is about 2.5 miles from the next and the trail offers views of tall grasses, birds and other wildlife.
Need a bike? Bring a helmet and rent one from a San Antonio Bike Share station.
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Olga Galindo, a member of the San Antonio Cyclones Cycling Club, says the Mission Reach is one of the club’s favorite spots because of its vast hills, protected nature and the friendliness between cyclists on the trail. “It’s really, really beautiful—the nature, the river, the people,” she says. “I’ve lived in San Antonio most of my life and I have really seen the city grow a lot. Places like the (Mission Reach) are giving a new reputation to the South Side. The South Side was never really known for cycling or any fitness opportunities, but now it’s really grown.” Cyclists looking for a shorter route can bike just a few miles each way on the Mission or Museum Reach. On the Museum Reach, start near Pearl and continue toward the Tobin Center for the Performing Arts before heading back north to avoid the increasing foot traffic usually found downtown.
EWING HALSELL PEDESTRIAN BRIDGE
The bridge that invites visitors across the Museum Reach of the River Walk near the San Antonio Museum of Art is the same 8.6ton bridge that once served as a connection point between the production and distribution towers of the building’s former life as the Lone Star Brewery. It sat in storage for years before being reinstalled just north of the brewery-turned-museum.
Mission Reach Paddling Trail Established in 2013, this ecosystem restoration project has been hugely successful in providing the opportunity to experience the river in its natural state. Difficulty: Beginner friendly Length: 8 miles Access: Roosevelt Park, Concepción Park, VFW Boulevard, Padre Park, Espada Park, Mission Parkway, Camino Coahuilteca SASPAMCO Paddling Trail This trail begins in Bexar County and ends in Wilson County. Difficulty: Some experience recommended Length: 29 miles Access: The San Antonio River Authority’s River Crossing Park, Grayton Park, John William Helton-San Antonio River Nature Park, County Road 117, Hwy. 97 Goliad Paddling Trail This paddling trail will be extended 12 miles in 2020 and another 13 miles are planned in the near future. Difficulty: Some experience recommended Length: 6.6 miles Access: Under Hwy. 59 in Goliad County, Ferry Street near Branch Nature Park, Goliad State Park
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28 Ways to Enjoy the River
Visit a Park Though much of the San Antonio River is privately owned downstream, the San Antonio River Authority has strategically acquired land so people can enjoy the river. “We have several different parks and amenities down the basin that we encourage people to explore,” general manager Suzanne Scott says.
Hugh Hardin has been fishing along the river all of his life but says he’s particularly grateful for the escape amid the COVID-19 pandemic. “There isn’t much we can do right now, so this is at least something we can do to pass the time. Fish, walk or just take a seat and watch the river go by,” says Hardin, who is now retired but started fishing on the river as a child with his father. “It’s very peaceful and you get your exercise in.” The San Antonio River Authority encourages catchand-release fishing along the Mission Reach boardwalk near Acequia Park, as well as in Wilson County from John William-Helton San Antonio River Nature Park and in Goliad at Branch River Park.
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Confluence Park Opened in 2018, the park was built on a former flat lot that was used for CPS Energy storage. Look for the 22 concrete petals that form together to create a main pavilion as well as the three smaller pavilions, each of which double as a water catchment system. Visit for yoga classes, arts events and more (some of these have gone virtual during COVID-19). San Pedro Creek Culture Park Once a place teeming with natural beauty, flood mitigation efforts in the early 1900s led to decreased vegetation and fewer ways for residents to connect with the water. That is changing thanks to a partnership between the city, Bexar County and the San Antonio River Authority. Phase one of the creek’s redevelopment was unveiled in 2018 and brought the start of a linear park, complete with public art by San Antonians and spaces for public events like yoga and community festivals. The second piece of Phase 1 is coming in 2021 and will bring a performance plaza near the Alameda Theatre, murals behind the Spanish Governor’s Palace and more green space. Once all four phases are complete, the park will stretch 2.2 miles.
John W. Helton San Antonio River Nature Park In this 98-acre park located just outside of Floresville there are over 3 miles of hiking/biking trails, picnic tables, BBQ grills, a playground, campsites that can be reserved for less than $10 a night and a paddling trail access point. It’s open daily, dawn to dusk. Graytown Park Located in Elmendorf and managed by the San Antonio River Authority, this 22-acre park features an 18-hole disc golf course, access to paddling trails, picnic areas and a pavillion. Branch River Park This park is located in Goliad County near the banks of the San Antonio River, with an amphitheater and a disc golf course for visitors to enjoy. Goliad State Park & Historic Site Enjoy access to the river, along with the Franciscan Mission Nuestra Señora del Espíritu Santo de Zuñiga, which was home to one of the state’s largest ranching operations in the 18th century.
COURTESY SAN ANTONIO RIVER AUTHORITY
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Taming the Wild When construction on the Mission Reach began 12 years ago, the area consisted of over 500 acres of wild and overgrown grass and shrubs, says Kristen Hansen, watershed and parks operations manager for the San Antonio River Authority. Through vigorous planting, native seeding, hand pulling and prescribed burning in some areas, the stretch from Lone Star Boulevard to Mission Espada now has many areas and parks that are thriving. Hansen says the project is about more than just bridging wildlife and residents; it’s about preserving the city’s history and quality. “If people are near the river, they’ll want to protect it,” Hansen says. “It’s part of our city, the history, and the more we can protect of it, the more people will want to experience it.” Look for these native plants and animals during your next River Walk stroll.
Native Plants (Head to the Mission Reach to spot a wide variety.)
Little Bluestem Switchgrass Firewheel Horsemint Maximilian Sunflower Huisache trees Mexican ash trees Cedar elm trees Pecan trees
Birds (There are over 200 species of birds throughout the five ecoregions along the river.)
Sandpipers Terns Gulls Herons Kestrels Hawks Passeriformes Pelicans Cormorants
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28 Ways to Enjoy the River
The River’s Keepers of years, but with greater populations came intervention and development and the need for oversight. Today, there’s an organization of people that manage its best interests, known as the San Antonio River Authority. Funded by property taxes, the authority upholds a commitment to “providing safe, clean and enjoyable creeks and rivers,” which in its 83 years has led to a multitude of partnerships, research initiatives and projects that integrate public health with ecosystems and sustainability with economic development. THE RIVER WAS A NATURAL RESOURCE FOR COMMUNITIES IN THE REGION FOR THOUSANDS
SAFE
ENJOYABLE
“The River Authority was originally created to
The River Authority also promotes ecosystem
see if the river could be navigable from the coast
restoration projects along the river, such as
to San Antonio so San Antonio could be a port
the well-known Mission Reach, where the nat-
city,” SARA's general manager Suzanne Scott
ural wonder of the river and its native habitat
says. It was quickly discovered that wouldn’t hap-
intertwines with public amenities, such as pad-
pen, and as the city began to grow and flooding
dling, hiking and biking trails. “The linear trail
became a pressing concern, the River Authority
network, including the Museum and Mission
pivoted to focus on flood control. The River
Reach along with the iconic downtown River
Authority’s scientists and engineers continue
Walk, is really starting to grow the affinity for
to improve the river from a flood control and
our natural resources,” Scott says. “People are
public safety perspective by making flood maps
understanding and appreciating the value
and models and providing technical resources
that these creeks and rivers play within our
to other governmental entities.
community from an economic development, environmental and quality-of-life standpoint.”
CLEAN
32
to allow space for people to enjoy time on the
ity is to keep the river clean. The more people
river. Right now, the River Authority is work-
there are, the greater the threat for pollution
ing to develop the San Pedro Creek Culture
ending up in the river (where all water drainage
Park, a paddling trail along the Medina River
in the city eventually leads). “We’re trying to
(a tributary to the San Antonio River), and
achieve a balance,” Scott says. “We work with
the “Trueheart Ranch,” which, according to
city planners and promote more sustainable
Scott, is a “beautiful property on old farmland
development. In other words, we can continue to
along the San Antonio River. There are a lot of
develop as a community, but can we incorporate
opportunities to connect history with nature at
more greenspace? We want to use nature in a
this location.” There are also plans to connect
way that supports our water resources.” This
the “Spirit Reach,” the area surrounding the
approach promotes low-impact, nature-based
headwaters of the river just north of downtown,
green infrastructures that slow pollution.
to the Museum Reach.
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COURTESY SAN SA RIVER ANTONIO AUTHORITY RIVER AUTHORITY
There are constantly more projects in the works
As the city expands, one job of the River Author-
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Look for Public Art
Museum Reach
From abstract sculptures and Spanish-inspired murals to architecturally exquisite walkways, the San Antonio River offers over a dozen places to view public art along the Museum Reach, Mission Reach and the soon-to-be, Escondido Creek Parkway. Walk or run the trail and look out for some of these pieces as you go.
PEARL TURNING BASIN A functional turning basin where river barge guests can hop on or off at Pearl, the basin was also designed with art and beauty in mind.
multicolored, hand-painted fiberglass. They hang from underneath the overpass near I-35 and Camden Street and are especially breathtaking at night when they’re lit up.
UNDER THE OVER BRIDGE The Ninth Street underpass is home to Mark Schlesinger’s piece, which was painted using the existing concrete. Visit it once during the day to see light zigzag across concrete cubes and at night to see strips of color across the bottom of the bridge.
HEMISFAIR PANELS Across from the San Antonio Museum of Art, these metal panels were made in Taiwan and were part of San Antonio’s 1968 World’s Fair.
THE GROTTO Concrete artist Carlos Cortes crafted this cave-like area with waterfalls and recessed lighting that guests can walk through at the bend between the Camden and Newell Street bridges. F.I.S.H Philadelphia artist Donald Lipski created the 25 7-footlong fish sculptures out of
PUENTE DE LOS ENCUENTROS Above the River Walk, the Brooklyn Street bridge railings were redesigned by artist and San Antonio native Rolando Briseño. SHIMMER FIELD Created by British artist Martin Richman, Shimmer Field is on display under the Lexington Street Bridge with reflective dichroic strips that are suspended from the bridge and move with the river breeze.
F.I.S.H.: COURTESY VISIT SAN ANTONIO; WHISPERS: COURTESY SAN ANTONO RIVER FOUNDATION/LARRY SERVIN
Mission Reach BUTTERFLIES This brightly colored bench is made of recycled aluminum cans and was inspired by artist Anita Valencia’s concern over the ecological impacts of consumerism. SERAPES These art benches just north of Confluence Park were inspired by vintage serapes given to artist Vincent Valdez by his grandmother and also by 2001: A Space Odyssey. YANAGUANA Artpace director Riley Robinson used a single piece of galvanized steel to craft this shaded bench near the Mission Espada Dam. Yanaguana,
the historic name for the river (and name of the park at Hemisfair) is cut into the steel along with depictions of native plants. THE ONCE AND FUTURE RIVER Anne Wallace etched images of the flora and fauna that once thrived along the river into sandstone on the bridge near Concepcion Park. ARBOL DE LA VIDA MEMORIAS Y VOCES DE LA TIERRA Created by British artist Margarita Cabrera, this piece celebrates San Antonio’s ranching heritage with a steel treelike structure. It’s also a
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nod to community as it’s adorned with 700 clay sculptures made by amateur artists from around San Antonio. COCOBIJOS Mel Chin’s sculpture welcomes visitors from the Mission Reach trail toward Mission San Jose. Atop the structure, sits a rooftop garden. WHISPERS The sculptures by Arne Quinze greet visitors exiting the river to visit Mission San Juan and are created with an array of colors that are meant to make the pieces look like they’re moving or communicating with one another.
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Moving History THE SAN ANTONIO RIVER IS, AND ALWAYS HAS BEEN, THE
COURTESY THE WITTE MUSEUM
“THE SPRINGS WERE SACRED, AND THE SPRINGS FED THE RIVER. AND THE RIVER WAS A SOURCE OF LIFE, A SOURCE OF RESOURCES, FISH, WATER AND IT ALSO ATTRACTED GAME.”
lifeblood of this land and those who reside on it. Twelve thousand years ago, its earliest inhabitants witnessed a large, crystal clear, rushing body of water nearly 200 feet in width. The headwaters of the San Antonio River, located on what’s now the University of the Incarnate Word’s campus just 4 miles north of downtown, were first inhabited by Native American hunter-gatherers. These headwaters, where the San Antonio Springs are located (and nearby, the San Pedro Springs), “were very sacred to the Native Americans because it was a portal into the underworld, which was a very important aspect of cosmology,” says Harry Shafer, Ph.D., curator of archeology at the Witte Museum. “The springs were sacred, and the springs fed the river. And the river was a source of life, a source of resources, fish, water and it also attracted game.” These early years of life on the river were filled with a dynamic flow of Native American tribes who came and went, all living off the land. When Spanish explorers reached the area in the late 17th century, they also settled along the river’s headwaters where Native Americans still resided. They soon found an abundant water resource in the midst of a semi-arid climate—the perfect place to establish San Antonio’s five missions, which were built between 1718 to 1731. With the Spanish came irrigation in the form of acequias, inspired by those in Southern Spain, to irrigate the farmland and service the missions. For over 150 years, this acequia system covered more than 50 miles and brought the life-giving sacred water of the river to the missions, fields, villas and jacal villages, allowing the city of
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COURTESY THE WITTE MUSEUM
San Antonio to not just thrive but also rapidly grow. In 1890, artesian wells were drilled into the Edwards Aquifer (which feeds the San Antonio Springs), turning the city’s reliance on water toward wells rather than the river. This impacted the spring flows and greatly decreased the flow of the river, bringing it to just a trickle in some areas. About 30 years later, in 1921, a tropical storm delivered 17 inches of rain to the upper Olmos Basin, causing the San Antonio River to rise and flood downtown buildings with up to 12 feet of water as well as flooding the San Pedro and Alazan creeks and the West Side neighborhoods surrounding them. As a result, Mayor John Tobin stimulated the first phase of modern development on the river with a proposal for a bond to pay for a dam at the Olmos Basin plus the construction of bridges and storm sewers. What started as flood control became a new season of re-imagining the river as both a vital, beautiful resource to be cared for and a place that could serve as a modern economic center. The San Antonio River Authority was founded in 1937 to assist in flood control efforts and later create hugely successful restoration projects; architect Robert Hugman and developer Jack White, manager of the White Plaza Hotel, planned the initial downtown River Walk in March 1941; hotels and restaurants opened along the River Walk in time for the many visitors of the 1968 World's Fair; and in 1998, the 13-mile expansion began to create the Museum and Mission Reaches. As these aspects of the river developed, tourists and locals alike gathered again to admire and enjoy the river that has stolen the hearts of so many before.
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SANDY ANGLIN PHILLIPS LOST HER DAUGHTER DURING A MASS SHOOTING IN COLORADO. SHE’S TURNED HER GRIEF INTO SURVIVORS EMPOWERED, A NONPROFIT THAT SUPPORTS THE FAMILIES OF OTHER VICTIMS, AND SHE’S AN OUTSPOKEN ADVOCATE FOR GUN CONTROL IN THE HOPES THAT IT WILL PREVENT OTHER MOMS FROM SUFFERING THE SAME FATE by
Katherine Stinson Josh Huskin
Photo Collage by
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Sandy Anglin Phillips didn’t have to be told who the victims’ families were when she and her husband, Lonnie, arrived a few days after the Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting in 2012.
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COURTESY SANDY ANGLIN PHILLIPS
“When we walked into the room where we were meeting some of the families, we saw them walk in and you didn’t have to tell us that they were the families that had lost someone,” she says. “I looked at Lonnie and Lonnie looked at me and we said, ‘Oh my God, that was us five months ago. And I knew then at that moment this was the work we were going to be doing.’” Just five months earlier, a deadly mass shooting in Aurora, Colorado, had changed Lonnie and Sandy’s life forever. Sandy’s daughter Jessica Ghawi, or Jessi, as friends and family called her, was living in Denver and working hard to make ends meet, waitressing while pursuing her dream of becoming a sports journalist through an internship. (Professionally, she used the name Jessica Redfield, her grandmother’s maiden name.) She’d interned at KABB in San Antonio and reported on the Rampage. Hockey was the sport that drew her to journalism. “She knew more about it than most of the guys in sports. They all would go to her for any hockey questions they had,” Phillips says. The weekend of July 19, 2012, Ghawi’s friend Brent Lowak was in town visiting from San Antonio. Ghawi wanted to go to the midnight premiere of The Dark Knight Rises. It took her a while to convince Lowak, but she was set on going so he eventually relented. “Jessi didn’t like taking no for an answer on anything!” Phillips says. “She was always tenacious.” Tickets for the midnight showing had already sold out so she reserved two seats for the 12:06 a.m. showing instead. “That’s what put the two of them into theater nine instead of theater eight,” Phillips says. Ghawi and Lowak took their seats in a packed theater and while waiting for the movie to start, she engaged in some friendly banter with a friend on Twitter who teased her about being on social media while at the theater. “Movie doesn’t start for 20 minutes,” she tweeted back at 11:37 p.m. It was her last tweet. Phillips got a call from Lowak in the early morning hours of July 20. He was still in the theater and told her there had been a shooting. Phillips asked about her daughter. They had just been texting before the movie started. Ghawi told her mom she was excited for her to come visit the following week. “Need my mama,” Ghawi texted—her final message.
BY THE NUMBERS
36,000
AMERICANS ARE KILLED EVERY YEAR BY GUN VIOLENCE, AT AN AVERAGE OF 100 PER DAY.
100,000
AMERICANS ARE SHOT AND INJURED EVERY YEAR.
AMERICANS ARE
25 TIMES
MORE LIKELY TO BE KILLED IN A GUN HOMICIDE THAN RESIDENTS OF OTHER HIGHINCOME COUNTRIES.
1,500
CHILDREN ARE SHOT AND KILLED EACH YEAR. GUN VIOLENCE IS THE SECONDLEADING CAUSE OF DEATH AMONG U.S. CHILDREN.
SOURCE: GIFFORDS LAW CENTER TO PREVENT GUN VIOLENCE
Phillips would soon learn that Ghawi was still inside of theater nine. She’d been shot six times. One of the shooter’s bullets had ripped through a theater seat with terrifying ease, leaving a 5-inch hole in Ghawi’s head. Two police officers, Aaron Blue and Everett Williams, found Ghawi in the theater, still breathing. They rushed her to a hospital in their patrol car because they knew ambulances were taking too long for someone in such fragile condition. “They tried everything in their power to save her,” Phillips says. Despite their efforts, Ghawi died at a Denver-area hospital shortly after arriving. She was 24. “It’s one of those things where you go, ‘but for a few minutes, she might’ve been safe.’ If she had just gone on to the computer earlier to buy the tickets or hadn’t been as tenacious about getting that ticket in the first place. But you know, what do you do? We were sitting in Texas and the shooting happened in Denver, so we felt very isolated. We didn’t know what to do, what to expect, who to contact. How does one go about this?” Phillips says, adding that her then-25-year-old son, Jordan Ghawi, insisted on traveling to Denver from San Antonio and handling details and media for the family. A SOFT PLACE TO LAND
The experience was so disorienting that Phillips and her husband realized as their world began to settle back down that they didn’t want others to go through that experience alone—and she knew, based on history, that there would be others. “There’s got to be some way to help people in this situation who have this happen to them,” Phillips says. Still, they didn’t expect their first outreach following a mass shooting would occur a mere five months after their daughter’s murder. Their organization started informally and was known as Jessi’s Message. The Phillipses understood the grief of losing a child in a traumatic way and wanted to see how they could help other families so when they heard about the tragedy at Sandy Hook, they took it upon themselves to travel to Connecticut and see what they could do. “Sandy Hook happened, and we responded. I remember talking to a couple of the families and letting them know what was ahead and knowing
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“The work that these survivors do just to get up in the morning and put one foot in front of the other is inspirational—nothing short of inspirational.”
fees and eventually had to declare bankruptcy to cover the costs. The organization that had worked with them made promises about coming to their aid with the fees before eventually disappearing. The experience left the Phillipses feeling abandoned and isolated all over again but also gave them more resolve to create an organization that truly helped the families of shooting victims. Jessi’s Message transformed into Survivors Empowered, which Phillips describes as a nonprofit organization built by survivors, for survivors, to empower survivors. “You’re in such shock when this happens to you, when it comes to your door— as it will everywhere in America at one time or the other unfortunately. You don’t know where to go or what to do,” she says, adding that in each new city they visit they connect with other grassroots organizations to form coalitions of support for families. “The people that do know about us will spread the word … I tell Lonnie all the time, ‘All we are is connectors. All we do is connect people to other people to other people that care about this issue and the gun violence survivors that are left behind.’” Phillips has long advocated for gun control, not just to help prevent mass shootings like the one that killed Ghawi and 11 other movie theater patrons (along with wounding 70), but also to help curb issues ranging from gang violence to community shootings and police brutality. It’s why the killing of George Floyd in May hit her so hard. “You can’t talk about Black Lives Matter without talking about the Black lives taken by guns in America. This country is steeped in racism. Racism equals gun violence. Until we start addressing the everyday shootings that are going on, the police brutality, addressing all sorts of violence toward Black lives then we aren’t helping that movement,” she says. “The Black Lives Matter protesters have done a great job of connecting the dots around the issues of their multifaceted movement and have gotten a lot done. The gun violence prevention groups could learn from that. It’s all about unity.” She says mass shootings, which often happen in majority white communities, tend to get a lot of media attention while gun violence in places like Chicago and Philadelphia, where victims are often Black, goes unnoticed by those not in the city. “We have to reach out to all communities,”
COURTESY SANDY ANGLIN PHILLIPS
they weren’t going to remember much of anything, but just letting the survivors know that there was someone there to hold their hand and have compassion for what they were going through was vital,” Phillips says. Early on, the Phillipses were connected with a gun violence prevention group that encouraged them to file a lawsuit against Lucky Gunner, the company that sold 6,000 rounds of ammunition to their daughter’s killer. They weren’t seeking damages but hoped their lawsuit would help spark change and allow for a red flag to go up if a civilian bought an exorbitant amount of ammunition. The judge threw the suit out before it even made it to court. Sandy and Lonnie were ordered to pay the $203,000 to cover Lucky Gunner’s court
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she says. “We have to reach out and start having these dialogues so that this can end. Until we do that, we know that every one of us is one degree of separation from this happening to one of our loved ones. We have to fix it.” Which is where Survivors Empowered comes in. Since Ghawi's death eight years ago, they've responded to 15 mass shootings. First and foremost, Phillips says their work is about providing a lifeline for survivors. They start by assisting survivors in finding trauma therapists. Knowing the media onslaught that follows a mass shooting, the Phillipses also spend time with victims’ families providing them tips about communicating with the press, if they wish to, as well as sharing ways they found helpful for coping with the continued coverage that occurred after their daughter was killed. If families want to get involved in advocacy work later, Survivors Empowered will help them in sharing their story as they work to educate communities. But it’s never an issue they force. It’s not the way everyone wants to grieve or work for change. “The work that these survivors do just to get up in the morning and put one foot in front of the other is inspirational—nothing short of inspirational,” Phillips says. “To know their stories and to talk with them on a regular basis, to see how they’re honoring their loved ones is just remarkable. I am more proud to stand with these people than anything else I’ve ever done other than be a mom.” In 2019, Survivors Empowered launched its first retreat for gun violence survivors, serving about 75 people who gathered just outside of Boston for three days of sessions on mindfulness techniques and healthy coping mechanisms, as they know victims’ families and those who survived mass shootings often deal with PTSD. “We wanted to provide a safe space for them,” Phillips says. Through fundraising efforts, she hopes to make the retreats a regular offering, albeit a virtual one during COVID-19. Their nonprofit operates solely on donations, many of which come from victims’ families who’ve benefited from its outreach. The work and the travel it requires—Phillips and her husband consider Boerne their home base but have a travel trailer so they can frequently traverse the country and be there to support victims’ families—keeps Phillips busy, but she admits nothing can keep the grief at bay. A photo of
GET INVOLVED LEARN MORE AT SURVIVORSEMPOWERED. ORG. PHILLIPS SAYS THEY ARE ALWAYS LOOKING FOR TRAUMA COUNSELORS WILLING TO VOLUNTEER.
Ghawi hangs in their house and they also travel with a portrait of her and wear her photo on a button when they go to meet with victims’ families in places like nearby Sutherland Springs, where they responded after a gunman killed 26 people in a church in 2017. “(Grief) is with you. Sometimes it’s not as bad, and other times it just happens, and you never know when that’s going to be … I look at that portrait every day and I never know how I’m going to react. Sometimes I can hear her giggle, other times it’s just this void that kicks me in the gut. You never know,” she says. “(I) tell new survivors, ‘This grief never goes away. It ebbs and flows. Sometimes it will lessen and sometimes the tsunami comes again. But somehow you live through it because that’s what you have to do. You have to live through it.’ Of course, some choose not to, which is the whole other side of this coin.” Ghawi had a blog, which she’d only published to twice, but her final post on June 5, 2012, is chilling. Just six weeks before her death, she was in Toronto visiting her boyfriend and narrowly escaped the June 2 shooting at the Eaton Centre mall. She wrote about how changing her mind about what to eat for dinner saved her life that day. She’d been “on a mission to eat sushi,” she wrote, but instead, once she arrived at the food court, she decided to go for a “greasy burger and poutine,” noting it was very uncharacteristic of her to change her mind like that. Moments after she ate her burger and walked out, a man opened fire on the food court. “Had I had sushi, I would’ve been in the same place where one of the victims was found,” she wrote. Phillips says she has to push the “what ifs” out of her mind. What if Jessi had been able to attend the midnight showing instead? What if she had been there with her instead of Lowak? Is there anything she could have done, any way she could have taken Jessi’s place? It’s a vicious cycle she knows won’t bring her back. And so she continues reaching out to other families and pushing for stricter gun control laws—a gun owner herself, she doesn’t want a ban on guns, just better controls, especially on “weapons of war”—in hopes that she’ll save another mother from this same fate. “I miss seeing the woman she could’ve become,” she says. “There’s not a day that goes by as a mother that I don’t think about talking to my daughter and spending time with her.”
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SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION
San Antonio
FACES T
he people of San Antonio are known for encouraging local business. Ingrained in the culture of our community, that support is what sets us apart from metro areas across the U.S. Often people are familiar with the brand but not the “face” behind the organization. To bring those faces to the forefront, San Antonio Magazine would like to introduce you to some of the game-changers and go-to professionals who call San Antonio home and truly make a difference to our great city.
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FACES OF SA 2020
The Face of ADULT RESPIRATORY DURABLE MEDICAL EQUIPMENT SAIL HEALTHCARE Elisabeth Caldwell is a graduate from UT Health San Antonio with a bachelor of science in respiratory care and biology. After working as a registered respiratory therapist at a local burn center, she was looking for a new challenge outside of critical care. That is when she learned about Sail Healthcare, an adult respiratory company. Its sister company, Wave Healthcare, is a pediatric respiratory company and, being familiar with their reputation in the respiratory community, she felt this would be a great opportunity to be on the forefront of home care equipment and innovative strategies on the adult side.
121 INTERPARK BLVD., STE. 308 • SAN ANTONIO, TX 78216 • 210-201-7245 (SAIL) • SAILHEALTHCARE.COM
Elisabeth Caldwell, RRT
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P H OTO BY S A R A H B RO O K E LYO N S
Sail Healthcare is an adult respiratory durable medical equipment (DME) company that provides a comprehensive range of respiratory equipment and supplies, including oxygen, ventilators, tracheostomy, CPAP or BiPAP equipment, or even enteral supplies. Their core competencies are the delivery and support of respiratory care equipment, which includes expert hospital-to-home education services, adult clinical respiratory support, as well as innovative medical equipment applications.
P H OTO BY S A R A H B RO O K E LYO N S
Currently, she is working with High Flow Nasal Cannula oxygen therapy for adult patients in a home setting to give patients the ability to maintain their lifestyles even with chronic respiratory conditions. High Flow therapy has been successful in giving patients the portability they need while providing them oxygen therapy. This opportunity derived through the successful use of High Flow with Wave Healthcare’s pediatric patients and the ability to work with physicians to customize the therapy for adults.
SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION
FACES OF SA 2020
The Face of PEDIATRIC RESPIRATORY DURABLE MEDICAL EQUIPMENT WAVE HEALTHCARE, LLC Shannon Hardy hails from Lubbock, as a Registered Respiratory Therapist. Throughout her respiratory career, helping children has always been her passion. Following a family tragedy, she chose to continue her work in the respiratory field in a different capacity. In 2013, Shannon left the hospital setting and came onboard at Wave Healthcare to work with home equipment and “home-based” respiratory care strategies with the goal of making the transition from hospital-to-home more seamless and decreasing patients’ hospital stays. Mere moments before the COVID-19 pandemic surrounded the U.S., she was promoted to Director of Clinical Operations. Shannon, along with colleague Elisabeth Caldwell, of Sail Healthcare, work as part of a collaborative COVID-19 Response Team. They meet regularly to discuss ever changing health and safety guidelines, revamp clinical approaches, and company policies to ensure both the pediatric and adult populations of Wave Healthcare and Sail Healthcare can, and will, be cared for in the safest ways possible while maintaining a high-level quality of service and care. It is extremely important to keep up to date on these issues to ensure the safety of not only the children, families, and caregivers that we serve, but of our employees, as well.
P H OTO BY S A R A H B RO O K E LYO N S
P H OTO BY S A R A H B RO O K E LYO N S
I have a plaque in my office titled “True Success” and, in short, it reads “...the world may be a little better because I was important in the life of a child”. Wave Healthcare’s primary focus is to improve healthcare for the children of Texas and it serves families who are looking for a comprehensive range of home medical supplies, whether respiratory, oxygen, pediatric ventilator, trach or enteral related.
121 INTERPARK BLVD., STE. 300 • SAN ANTONIO, TX 78216 • 210-593-9283 (WAVE) • WAVEHEALTHCARE.COM
Shannon Hardy, RRT, Director of Clinical Operations
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FACES OF SA 2020
The Face of BANKING
1177 N.E. LOOP 410 • SAN ANTONIO, TX 78209 • 210-283-6500 • BROADWAY.BANK
From left: Brandy Blake, Juan Maldonado, Sabrina Williams, Sandra Villaseñor, Matt Delgado, Reid Reagan
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P H OTO BY S A R A H B RO O K E LYO N S
For nearly 80 years, Broadway Bank has served the financial needs of South Central Texas. As our customers’ needs and technology evolved, so has the way we do business. Our innovative technology and mobile offerings, combined with our commitment to deliver personalized customer service, drive our mission to deliver the best banking experience resulting in lasting relationships. Broadway Bank offers a full range of sophisticated financial services, including personal, private, business and mortgage banking, and wealth management. As one of the largest privately owned financial institutions, we’re shaping the future of banking while honoring our rich history. This is modern banking, locally sourced and personally delivered. Connect with us digitally or in person at any of our financial centers in Austin and the surrounding communities. Visit broadway.bank for more information. Member FDIC.
P H OTO BY S A R A H B RO O K E LYO N S
BROADWAY BANK
SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION
FACES OF SA 2020
The Face of REAL ESTATE PHYLLIS BROWNING COMPANY Known for selling some of the city’s most elite addresses, Jennifer Shemwell is one of the most respected names in San Antonio real estate, following closely in the footsteps of her mother, Phyllis Browning, as a luxury real estate agent, trendsetter and community leader. Her knowledge of San Antonio’s multi-faceted real estate market complements her expertise in strategically marketing the area’s most prestigious properties and elite estates. The innovative thinking, solution-driven negotiating skills and unique marketing tactics that Jennifer employs ensure clients that she will achieve the very best deal in the shortest amount of time.
P H OTO BY S A R A H B RO O K E LYO N S
P H OTO BY S A R A H B RO O K E LYO N S
With over 25 years of experience, Shemwell is consistently recognized by the San Antonio Business Journal as one of the city’s top luxury real estate agents. Her clients call her to find “that dream home not on the market.” Shemwell prides herself on her discretion and confidentiality. A graduate of Yale University and fluent in three languages, Shemwell loves people. She enjoys mentoring new agents and helping people become their best. With clients, it’s all about creating a worry-free experience and making the sales process as simple as possible. Shemwell’s dedication to lifelong learning is inspiring to her colleagues and friends alike. An alumna of Harvard Business School, she has graduated from both the prestigious Leadership San Antonio program and the President’s Program in Leadership. Overwhelmingly recognized and respected by industry leaders, Shemwell has received the 2018 Realtor® Broker of the Year award from the San Antonio Board of Realtors® as well as the 2018 C-Suite Award from the San Antonio Business Journal.
6061 BROADWAY • SAN ANTONIO, TX 78209 • 210-824-7878 • PHYLLISBROWNING.COM
Jennifer Shemwell, President
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FACES OF SA 2020
The Face of MODERN LASIK AND LASER CATARACT SURGERY NUVISION “I wish I would have done this sooner!” Many patients who were tired of dryness with contact lenses, thick glasses, or even the 200 pairs of reading glasses around the house, routinely say this after modern LASIK or laser cataract surgery. Are you next? If so, the NuVision doctors are the faces of modern LASIK and laser cataract surgery in San Antonio, and they are here to help.
9725 DATAPOINT DRIVE, STE. 106 • SAN ANTONIO, TX 78229 • 210-585-2020 • NUVISIONTX.COM
Clockwise from left: Brett W. Davies, MD, MS; Brett H. Mueller II, DO, PhD; Thomas Nettleton, OD; Anthony Vanrachack, OD; Roberto Saenz, OD, MS, FAAO; Alexandra Wiechmann, OD; Gregory D. Parkhurst, MD, FACS 48
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Their surgeons have performed tens of thousands of successful procedures for military pilots and snipers, professional athletes, musicians, and even their own family members. NuVision has been named alongside H-E-B and USAA in the “Top 3 Places to Work in San Antonio” for multiple years.
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At NuVision, you will find a team of residency and fellowship trained doctors who work hand-in-hand with your optometrist to help you get the crisp, clear vision you should have. They create customized vision solutions for people who visit the NuVision team from around the world. NuVision is the only place in Texas to specialize in laser cataract surgery, modern LASIK and all six of its variations. These variations include the SMILE procedure, Visian ICL permanent contact lenses, and even procedures to restore reading vision after 40. In addition, the NuVision surgical team performs the latest techniques in eyelid rejuvenation surgery, designed to improve your vision and restore your youthful appearance.
SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION
FACES OF SA 2020
The Face of PERSONAL INJURY LAW TINSMAN & SCIANO, INC. Tinsman & Sciano, Inc. has been representing clients in San Antonio and throughout the state of Texas for the last 50 years.
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Founded on the premise that each client’s case is of the utmost importance, our dedicated team of attorneys and support staff is committed to providing our clients with the best possible legal representation. The firm’s attorneys have the experience, training and resources to handle serious and complex litigation including claims involving bodily injuries, wrongful death, trucking and vehicular collisions, medical malpractice, federal tort, defective products, unsafe premises, trust disputes, will contests, and disputes regarding oil and gas royalties. Tinsman & Sciano, Inc. is rated AV® Preeminent™ by Martindale-Hubbell® and has been ranked as one of the Best Law Firms in every edition of the U.S. News & World Report/Woodward-White’s Best Lawyers® issue since they first started their rankings in 2010.
10107 MCALLISTER FREEWAY • SAN ANTONIO, TX 78216 • 210-225-3121 • TOLL FREE: 800-292-9999 • TSSLAWYERS.COM
Clockwise from front: Daniel J.T. Sciano*, Grant McFarland**, Aaron Valadez, Jeffrey C. Anderson**, Lawrence J. Webb, Stephen F. Lazor, Alva Marquez *Daniel J.T. Sciano is Board Certified by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization in both Civil Trial Law and Personal Injury Trial Law. **Grant McFarland and Jeffrey C. Anderson are Board Certified by the Texas Board of Legal Specialization in Personal Injury Trial Law.
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FACES OF SA 2020
The Face of FINANCIAL FIDUCIARY
20650 STONE OAK PKWY., STE. 100 • SAN ANTONIO, TX 78258 • 210-530-1292 • TEXASFINANCIALADVISORY.COM
Brooklynn Chandler Willy and Yvette Villanueva Barrera
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How much money have you saved in an IRA or 401k? Now, let’s say it’s $750,000. You know that $750,000 isn’t all yours, right? Because when you withdraw that money in retirement for income, you still have to pay taxes on it. And those taxes could be a lot more than you realize. But there are some simple tax planning strategies that could help you significantly reduce the taxes on those retirement accounts, so you can keep more of your hard-earned money in your pocket. Request our whitepaper on Taxes in Retirement by texting TAX to 1-844-TFA-SHOW (1-844-832-7469). Listen to the Texas Financial Advisory Radio Show every Sunday at 10 a.m. on WOAI 1200 AM or 1 p.m. on KTSA 550 AM. Disclosure: We are an independent financial services firm helping individuals create retirement strategies using a variety of insurance products to custom suit their needs and objectives. Texas Financial Advisory are not tax or legal advisors and this information should not be considered tax or legal advice. Consult with a tax and/or legal advisor for such issues.
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TEXAS FINANCIAL ADVISORY
SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION
FACES OF SA 2020
The Face of DENTAL
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7 TO 7 DENTAL Since 7 to 7 Dental first opened its doors in San Antonio over a decade ago, the mission has been to provide dental care during days and times that are convenient to the patient, not the doctor. This progressive approach to care started with four employees at one office and has grown into over 200 team members across six locations in San Antonio. Still locally owned and operated by Justin Coke and Dr. Tiffany Winburn, your friendly neighborhood dentist is here to stay.
10103 W. LOOP 1604 N., STE. 104 • SAN ANTONIO, TX 78254 • 210-495-2000 • 7TO7DENTAL.COM
From left: Makayla Taylor, Mandy Dennis, Monica Rodriguez, Dr. Lomeli, Dr. Winburn, Travis DeZuba, Justin Coke, Mike Burns, Dr. Lowery
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FACES OF SA 2020
The Face of PUBLIC RELATIONS
7550 W. I-10, STE. 150 • SAN ANTONIO, TX 78229 • 210-582-0505 • NOISYTRUMPET.COM
Fron left: Sarah Strunk, Fran Yanity, Clarissa Castaneda
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Noisy Trumpet is a nationally recognized integrated digital and public relations agency driven by statistical insights and designed to elevate brands across various marketing channels. The agency is led by a staff of digital and communications specialists who craft a brand’s voice, activate the relevant platforms to tell the brand’s story, and ultimately generate awareness and sales. With deep expertise in digital, web, social media, and public relations, Noisy Trumpet stays abreast of the latest industry trends to identify new opportunities for clients in for profit and nonprofit industries. The understanding of business and the customer’s journey through the buying process has helped Noisy Trumpet give brands a voice to further their mission and deliver results. Noisy Trumpet has received various industry accolades including being nationally recognized by PR News and PR Daily for their work with the Devils River Conservancy. In addition, the agency has been honored by the Public Relations Society of America and the American Marketing Association for work with San Antonio Sports Foundation and identified as the fourth largest public relations firm as well as a top 10 social media marketing firm by the San Antonio Business Journal.
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NOISY TRUMPET DIGITAL AND PUBLIC RELATIONS
SPECIAL ADVERTISING SECTION
FACES OF SA 2020
The Face of HOME LOANS FIRST UNITED BANK AND TRUST When it comes to doing a job with excellence, San Antonio’s Team Guidry does it best. Led by Jen Guidry, San Antonio’s top loan officer, the team includes four others who work diligently. They love to make the home loan process as easy as possible for their customers. Their dedication to and love for their clients, work ethic and problem solving skills make them one of the best teams in the nation. Without them, it would be impossible for Jen to have soared up the ranks in her field, becoming one of the top 25 women loan originators in the United States.
“We love helping people and we believe that the mortgage process doesn’t have to be a painful one,” she says. At First United, we offer purchase, construction, physician and refinance loans and are here to help you with your next mortgage. For more information, please go to our website at SALending.com. P H OTO BY S UZ A N N E PAC K
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You may have seen her face on TV, as she loves to be a guest on San Antonio’s morning shows, but she could not do what she does without her teammates. Together, they work diligently day in and day out to make sure that their loans close on time.
NMLS #323935 210-619-2690 SALENDING.COM
Jen Guidry
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FACES OF SA 2020
The Face of COSMETIC DENTISTRY COSMETIC DENTISTRY OF SAN ANTONIO Cosmetic Dentistry of San Antonio is in the business of building confidence. Dr. Edward J. Camacho and his team help patients transform their smiles to ones that are healthy, vibrant and natural. With 40 years of experience, Dr. Camacho utilizes all phases of general dentistry, orthodontics, bleaching utilizing the most highly technical equipment and techniques. A confident smile can advance a career, improve personal relationships, and build self esteem to confront the challenges of life. Our motto is “A Better Smile.... A Better You.... A Better Life!”
16530 HUEBNER ROAD, STE. 301 • SAN ANTONIO, TX 78248 • 210-493-9944 • COSMETICDENTISTRYOFSA.COM
Edward J Camacho, DDS, Confidence Builder
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and porcelain veneers to give patients a smile that they are proud of and confident in displaying. These services are offered in an ultra-modern office
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Eat + Drink I NSI D E / PAST RY CHE F E XT RAORD IN AIRE p. 58 / BREAKFAST P B& J p. 60 / A FRUITY D ESSERT p . 6 1
THE MODERNIST IN GRE D I E N TS 1 ½ ounces bourbon ½ ounce lapsang tea syrup* 2 dashes Scrappy’s Black Lemon Bitters (available at Alamo City Liquor) 2 dashes Angostura Bitters Lemon peel for garnish
516 E. Grayson St. 210-901-8646 facebook.com/ themodernist
P RE PARATI O N Add all liquid ingredients into your favorite chilled short glassware or rocks glass. Carefully add a large ice cube and stir with a chopstick or spoon. Twist lemon peel over the cocktail or drop it in the glass and enjoy. *To make the Lapsang Souchong Tea syrup, add 3 teaspoons loose leaf lapsang souchong tea and 8 ounces sugar to 16 ounces water. Heat in a small saucepan over medium heat. Stir to dissolve sugar and bring to a boil. Once boiling, remove from heat and let seep for 3 minutes. Strain the mixture and let it cool before bottling.
A Touch of Smoke Loose leaf Souchong tea is the key to this cocktail recipe from The Modernist he team at The Modernist is known for being able to craft just the right drink based on whatever spirits and flavors a customer says they prefer. Menus with clever cocktail names (or menus, at all) aren’t really their thing. When COVID-19 forced them to shutter their doors in March—and again in June after reopening for just a few weeks— bartender David Naylor says they had to get creative to stay true to their mission of customization, creating cocktail kits for a variety
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of palates so they could still cater to a variety of customers even without being able to chat with them barside. This month, those offerings include a smoky, bourbon-based cocktail that relies on housemade lapsang tea syrup crafted with naturally smoky loose leaf tea that can be found locally at Tim’s Oriental Seafood & Market. It’s added to Old Forester Bourbon, a classic 86 proof, and combined with a touch of lemon to achieve, according to Naylor, the perfect balance of acidic and sweet.—KP
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Monte Vista’s Sweet Genius Chef Jess Philpot’s pastries, breads and work ethic are all ‘Extra Fine’ BY EDMUND TIJERINA he best part about walking into the cozy little Extra Fine bakery just north of downtown is discovering which assorted goodies the creative mind of pastry chef Jessica Philpot, who goes by Jess, has concocted that day—rye chocolate chip cookies, blueberry yuzu muffins, decadent cinnamon rolls. Alas, there’s no walkup service yet, but that doesn’t mean locals can’t enjoy her desserts. Since 2014, Philpot has been the sweet genius providing the desserts to the Empty Stomach Group restaurants, and is now a partner in Extra Fine, the forthcoming bakery from Chad Carey’s Empty Stomach Group. She had always wanted to have a bakery and she and Carey moved into action last year when a one-time cake shop space opened up in Monte Vista. Her focus for the bakery right now is providing desserts for the group’s eateries, Barbaro and Hot Joy, plus breads for its Little Death wine shop, but she also takes on special customer orders when asked.
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“Jess is part of a dying breed in the culinary world … meaning, people who have both innate talent and the work ethic to produce delicious things,” Carey says. “That combination is exceptionally rare … people that can undertake creative work but also understand the effort required to bring it to life.” Philpot, 37, originally wanted to be a teacher and studied education before finding her passion in food and switching to culinary arts at St. Philip’s College. After graduating in 2002, she went to work at the newly opened SBC Center (now known as the AT&T Center). “I remember the guy putting me in pastries because I was a chick,” she says. “I didn’t know otherwise, but I loved it.” She knew she needed to raise her game, so she left her native San Antonio to study at Chicago’s French Pastry School, which she described as a “dream come true.” “It was intense because it was all these formulas and math,” she says. “It just blew my mind how you can do all these things
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IN THE KITCHEN
Visit sanantoniomag.com/ almondcake for a glutenfree almond cake recipe by Philpot.
with chocolate and sugar.” She graduated from pastry school in 2006 and moved with a then-boyfriend to Los Angeles, where she fell in love with the city’s culture, energy and independence. With her training and culinary execution, she began working a series of jobs at some of LA’s most notable restaurants, including Akasha and two-Michelin-starred Providence. “At the time, I didn’t even know what Michelin stars were,” Philpot says. “I didn’t understand the caliber of that kind of restaurant until I got hired. It was scary and difficult. I wouldn’t trade it for anything. If something was cut wrong, you just didn’t use it.” In 2013, she returned home to be with her mother, who was fighting adrenal cancer and passed away the following year. Philpot worked briefly at the Culinary Institute of America - San Antonio and then met chef/restaurateur Tim McDiarmid, of Tim the Girl and now The Good Kind, who introduced her to Bakery Lorraine’s Anne Ng and Jeremy Mandrell. She worked with them for a bit and they introduced her to Carey. Philpot began working with the Empty Stomach Group a year after coming home. Instead of a Michelin-level setup, she took her new station in a dedicated corner of the Hot Joy kitchen. She fit in quickly, even working with Chef Quealy Watson on a dish that used pig brains. “I had worked at Lukshon, a lauded LA restaurant. They were both Asian-influenced restaurants, so I already knew the ingredients,” she says. “I also took a lot of lead from each chef.” On her second day at Hot Joy, she met Chef John Philpot, then at Carey’s much-lamented The Monterey. They started dating secretly about eight months later after they had collaborated on some creative desserts. Why secretly? She wanted to avoid drama, she explains. They married in 2016 and have a daughter, 3-year-old Ember. Now, Philpot says the focus is on her family and doing what she can to help all of the businesses in the Empty Stomach Group. Carey says hers is a fun career to watch. “Jess manages to do this work while also being kind, and being a wonderful mom and wife to John, which makes her even more rare,” he says.
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E AT + D R I N K / S P OT LI G H T
10 OPTIONS FOR SOUTH TEXAS BARBECUE 2M SMOKEHOUSE $$ (Southeast) Esaul Ramos
serves all of the classic Texas fare—from brisket and pulled pork to spare ribs and turkey—with a Mexican flair. That means you can expect tortillas instead of slices of bread, BBQ tacos and tres leches cake. Get there early. The restaurant closes when the meat sells out. 2731 S. W.W. White Road, 210-885-9352, 2msmokehouse.com AUGIE’S BARBED WIRE SMOKEHOUSE $-$$
(Downtown) A San Antonio staple for more than 20 years, Augie’s delivers meat that’s slow-smoked over an iron pit until it has just the right amount of tenderness and flavor. Not into brisket? Its Chickadee sandwich, Augie chili cheese dog and hamburger delivers. 3709 N. St. Mary’s St., 210735-0088, augiesbbq.com THE BARBECUE STATION $ (North Central) Fam-
ily meals with all of the classics feed four to seven while combination plates feature brisket, pork, sausage, turkey or other meats plus traditional sides like creamed corn and pinto beans. For dessert, opt for the peach cobbler or mint pecan pie. 1610 N.E. Loop 410, 210-824-9191, barbecuestation.com B-DADDY’S BARBECUE $$ (Helotes) From Ger-
Berry Yummy Sweets offers new takes on classic chocolate-covered strawberries Leslie Vasquez has always loved chocolate-covered strawberries. For virtually every occasion she would make them for herself and her family. She shared a photo of one of her treats on her Instagram story one day, commenting that if people wanted her to share, they’d have to pay her for one. To her surprise, her inbox began filling with messages from people saying, “I would buy these from you.” Six months later, after some entrepreneurial encouragement from her husband, that post turned into Berry Yummy Sweets, a made-to-order dessert business that Vasquez runs from home. A stay-athome mom to 2-year-old and 8-month-old daughters, Vasquez says it’s more of a “naptime hustle” than a side business, but it’s an endeavor she’s excited to fit in between feedings and playtime. Custom orders can include straight-forward chocolate covered strawberries, but Vasquez prides herself on the array of unique toppings she offers,
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from Oreo crumbles and candy bar pieces to Fruity Pebbles and Alamo Candy Co. chamoy. “It’s more than just the chocolate-covered strawberry with some drizzled lines on it,” Vasquez says. She often gets inspiration from her friends and family, including her aunt, a culinary school grad who first taught Vasquez to make desserts. A friend recently suggested cheesecake strawberries, so Vasquez added those to the lineup. Online orders can be placed for existing strawberry creations, or customers can make requests for boxes crafted to feature certain colors or themes. “Strawberries aren’t really a common dessert that you can just look up and say, ‘Let me see a Pokemon-themed strawberry,’” Vasquez says, adding that she’s already planning Abuelita hot chocolate strawberries for December. “I try to create something and then see if (customers) like it and most of the time they do.” Vasquez says she tries to support other local companies, like Alamo Candy Co., when she can because she knows just how much it means every time she receives an order for pickup or delivery. “Anytime you support a small business I think you’re supporting somebody’s dream,” Vasquez says. berryyummysweets.com—ALEX FULTON
tea glazed ribs, there’s something for everyone here. Sides range from borracho beans and chipotle slaw to jalapeño cheddar cream corn and there are plenty of family specials if you’re looking to order takeout. 14435 Old Bandera Road, 210-2759995, bdaddysbbq.com BURNWOOD ’68 $-$$ (Northeast) Traditional
platters with brisket and all of the expected sides are available plus ribs, BBQ sandwich family packs and creative specials like Spicy Doritos Brisket Nachos. Enjoy meals on the patio outside or take it to go. Catering is also available. 18745 Redland Road, 210-481-4166, burnwood68.com DIGNOWITY MEATS $-$$ (Dignowity Hill) Its
Burnt End Melt, which features smoked brisket burnt ends, cheddar mac, sliced pear and sauce on ciabatta bread, earned it acclaim on Diners, Drive Ins and Dives. This East Side deli/barbecue joint has also mastered the house-smoked pastrami plus a classic Reuben and “The Pop,” which includes Cajun smoked turkey breast, citrus BBQ and provolone. 1701 E. Houston St., 210-462-1496, dignowitymeats.com
COURTESY BERRY YUMMY SWEETS
DECADENT DESSERTS
man-style beef links to jalapeño sausage and sweet
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SMOKE SHACK $-$$ (Mahncke Park) Traditional
barbecue sandwiches and plates come with expertly smoked meat and Southern sides like collard greens or fried okra. If it’s comfort food you crave, skip the expected and opt for the mouthwatering brisket grilled cheese or Smoke Shack Mac—a hearty serv-
TEA TIME ANYTIME Meet Flower Girl Apothecarie, the only San Antonio business to be featured in Magnolia’s Black Artisans Virtual Vendor Fair
ing of mac and cheese piled with chopped brisket and barbecue sauce. Visit the meat market next door and take a cut home to smoke on your own. 3714 Broadway, 210-957-1430, smokeshacksa.com SOUTH BBQ + KITCHEN $$ (South) One of San
Antonio Magazine’s Best New Restaurants of 2019, this South Side eatery is the brainchild of Andrew Samia, who also owns Dignowity Meats. All of the sauces and sides, including creamed elote, are made-in house, Samia does his own pickling and the meats—whether the Angus brisket, pulled pork, sausage or chicken legs—are simply perfection. A select menu also is available at Weathered Souls Brewing Co. South BBQ + Kitchen closed during COVID19, so check its website for updates. 2011 Mission Road, 210-437-0070, southbbqkitchen.com THE SMOKEHOUSE $-$$ (Southeast) Select
brisket, pork ribs, turkey, sausage and more from a 40-foot indoor pit after it’s slow-smoked over mesquite wood. Order by the pound or as part of a plate with Spanish rice and pinto beans and don’t forget to ask about dessert. 3306 Roland Ave., 210333-9548, thesmokehousebbqsa.com TWO BROS. BBQ MARKET $-$$ (North Central)
Jason Dady’s crew delivers everything you could expect from a classic Texas BBQ joint, as well as the delightfully unexpected. Opt for the cheesy chop to combine your favorite side with mouthwatering brisket and always save room for cobbler. Indoor and outdoor seating is available. 12656 West Ave.,
TEA: COURTESY ARIANNA STENSON; ED: DAVID G. LOYOLA
Ste. B, 210-496-0222, twobrosbbqmarket.com
$
Most Entrees Under $10
$$
Most Entrees $10 to $25
$$$
Most Entrees Over $25
Restaurants' service and menus may be affected by COVID-19. Please call ahead to confirm. For our full directory San Antonio restaurants, visit sanantoniomag.com/restaurants-bars.
Tea has always been a staple for Arianna Stenson. A military kid who grew up primarily along the coasts while her dad served in the Navy, Stenson says her mom, a Houston native, made sure there was always sweet tea in the house. At night, her mom routinely pulled out sleepy time tea to help Stenson fall asleep. “I just thought it was so cool there was a tea for that,” says Stenson, who graduated from high school in Cibolo and attended University of the Incarnate Word. “Wherever we went, tea was my drink of choice.” Now a financial analyst by day, Stenson several years ago began spending her free time learning more about tea, even enrolling in tea sommelier classes and completing courses on herbal teas so she could start blending her own varieties. She began sharing those teas with a friend at a yoga class who encouraged her to sell the various blends she was creating. “She kept persisting and said, ‘These are different than what I find in the store,’” Stenson says. After a few months, Stenson relented. Growing up, she had frequently been called a flower child, so she used the nickname as
inspiration for her business and Flower Girl Apothecarie was born. She debuted her products at the Boerne Handmade Market in 2018 and has since shared her teas at markets throughout the area. When COVID-19 brought the cancelation of her regular stops, Stenson moved her sales online, shipping tea blends to customers and introducing a sampler pack. She’s also working to add virtual guided tastings. “It’s been a lot of pivoting and figuring out how to make this digital,” she says. In June, an anonymous fan nominated Flower Girl Apothecarie to be a part of Chip and Joanna Gaines’ Virtual Vendor Fair Celebrating Black Artisans, Makers and Business Owners. The online marketplace is meant to be a digital version of the Silobration vendor fair the couple holds at their Magnolia headquarters in Waco. Stenson is the only San Antonian featured. Stenson says she was taken by surprise but is glad to have a way to connect with more tea lovers. To make her teas stand out, Stenson handcrafts tea blends in a commercial kitchen with ingredients and tea leaves ethically sourced from South Africa, India and elsewhere. She sometimes spends up to a month perfecting her flavor profiles. “I feel like tea should be whimsical,” she says. Along with green, black and white teas, which are made from the Camellia sinensis plant, as well as herbal teas, Stenson sells teapots with infusers so that customers can easily brew her loose-leaf teas. flowergirlapothecarie.com—KP
When you go out to eat or order takeout, do you have a go-to dish or do you try and eat your way through a menu? When I’m trying a new place, I work my way through the menu over a couple of visits. But once I have a feel for the menu, I’ll definitely focus on some favorites. Whenever I get something from Cured, it always includes charcuterie. No matter what else I get at Ming’s Thing, I make sure to order some pork belly buns. Lately, I have been snagging the suadero tacos at Mixtli at least once every couple of weeks. I have also been ordering family takeout meals or combos. One of my favorites is the family date night special at Meadow: two three-course adult meals and two kid’s meals plus a bottle of wine. The three-course special at Biga on the Banks changes regularly and absolutely rocks. Then there’s always the fried chicken special at Southerleigh. Have a question for Ed? Email asked@sanantoniomag.com
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OFF MENU News from the restaurant scene
PB&J WITH TAY
Twist on a Classic
5335 McCullough Ave. 210-518-8299 pbjwithtay.com 11 a.m.-4 p.m. Tues-Sat
PB&J with Tay elevates a childhood favorite BY KATHLEEN PETTY eremiah Burns was finishing breakfast one day when he realized a new sandwich recipe was sitting right in front of him. He put down his jelly toast and finished off his eggs and bacon and decided the next monthly special at his restaurant, PB&J with Tay, would be the sandwich version of his ultimate breakfast. “It’s a total breakfast in a sandwich,” he says. Now known as The Eggcellent PB&J—made with peanut butter, an over-hard egg, crunchy bacon and strawberry jalapeño jam on Texas toast—the creation was such a hit that it’s now a staple on the menu of 11 signature sandwiches. Opened in October 2019, the restaurant in The Yard at Olmos Park is a second business for Burns, who also works as a massage therapist. “Massage therapy is usually about pain management and I just wanted to branch out and do something that was a little more fun and upbeat,” he says. He and his fiancé, Taylor Negrete, were brainstorming when he threw out the idea of an eatery based on his childhood favorite, peanut butter and jelly. Initially they agreed it might not work for a full menu but after discovering similar concepts that had flourished in other states, the two were all in. They named it for their 3-year-old daughter, Taylynn Mia, and remodeled a space within walking distance of Burns’ other venture, The R&R Station.
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Along with the breakfast-style sandwich, the menu features a classic Elvis (peanut butter, bacon and banana), the Pooh Bear (peanut butter, banana, walnuts and honey) and the best-selling Kitchen Sink, which is a double decker sandwich filled with peanut butter, Nutella, cream cheese, walnuts, bacon, banana, coconut flakes and your choice of jelly. Jams are all sourced from San Antonio’s Lone Star Pure. There is also a build-your-own sandwich option. When COVID-19 first hit San Antonio, Burns closed the restaurant for a month before deciding to reopen for takeout (and then dine in starting May 1). He and his business partner Ricky Schweinsberg also knew they needed to get creative to thrive in this new atmosphere so they added a PB&J with Tay food trailer serving the full menu that Schweinsberg brings to apartment complexes, businesses and even weddings. Burns now sees massage therapy clients in the mornings and late afternoons and dedicates the middle of his days to creating and toasting the ultimate lunchtime treat, which he prefers served with chips and a cold glass of milk. “We serve a nostalgic sandwich with kindness and love,” Burns says, explaining that he always takes the time to ask people how their day is going—and insists he wants to hear about it, even if the answer is “not great.” “We want people to feel like they’re at home when they’re eating here.”
La Nostra Famiglia Trattoria opened near Bitters and Blanco roads with a menu by Kim Van Winkle, who previously worked at Battalion. / Magnolia Pancake Haus broke ground on a third location in Cibolo, slated to open by the end of the year. / Pollos Asados Los Norteños opened a second location near Rackspace. / The Hayden, a New York–style deli, will open in the coming months on Broadway near Hildebrand. / A second Holy Smoke Barbecue + Taquitos truck is now open at The Growler Exchange on Broadway. Its original truck lives at The Point Park and Eats. / Andrew Weissman is close to opening his second Mr. Juicy in a former Jack in the Box at San Pedro Avenue and Hildebrand. / After seeing its sales drop by more than 25 percent this spring, Taco Cabana’s parent company closed all of its dining rooms in July and saw sales increase when they shifted their focus to to-go margaritas and other items. / Adrian Martinez permanently closed Smoke downtown, saying the large restaurant was not profitable with a limited capacity, but he reopened days later in a smaller venue on East Crockett Street. / Sister restaurant to the Jerk Shack, Mi Roti opened at the Pearl's Bottling Dept. food hall.
PHOTO BY BRENDA PIÑA
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LOOKING BACK
VIEW THE BRANDS
Select cattle brands are at the San Antonio African American Community Archive and Museum. Fly also produces hats featuring some of the designs.
Historic cattle brands shed light on the history of African American cowboys and land ownership in San Antonio BY KATHLEEN PETTY
t was the discovery of a historic African American cemetery on the city’s Northeast Side that sparked historian and landscape architect Everett Fly’s now five-year research project into historic African American cattle brands. Fly was assisting retired Maj. J. Michael Wright in research after Wright came across the grounds, and while the two were looking through decades-old documents, Fly was struck by a copy of a cattle brand certificate that had been filed in 1875 by Jane Warren, a former slave who owned land in Bexar County. “I kind of had a moment,” says Fly, who was awarded a National Humanities Medal in 2014 for his work to preserve African American places throughout the U.S. “My grandfather was a cowboy in Nacogdoches County and he had a cattle brand—I still have the branding iron, so a light bulb just went off.” The registration of cattle brands goes back to the days of the Spanish settlers in San Antonio, so Fly went to the Bexar County Spanish Archives where he was able to comb through scans, microfilm and old ledger books containing cattle brand registration records. Once he identified a brand, he went through birth, death and census records to verify the person’s identity and race. “There’s no index where you can go and say, ‘I’m looking for all the African American cattle brands,” he says. “It’s catch as catch can and it’s a complicated process to verify.” In the last five years, Fly has uncovered more than 70 brands that were registered to African Americans between the decade before the Civil War and around the start of World War I, including five that were registered to women. Fly is still researching but says what he’s uncovered thus far helps to build a better picture of what African American land ownership looked like in Bexar County in the decades after slavery ended. “San Antonio has a very poor record of acknowledging and respecting African American history. For too long—literally centuries—we’ve allowed myths to be used to represent and explain and document Black history,” says Fly, who cofounded the San Antonio African American Community Archive and Museum. “These documents prove that Black folks lived all over San Antonio and Bexar County.”
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COURTESY EVERETT FLY
Branding History
SEPTEMBER 2020
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SAN ANTONIO MAGAZINE SEPTEM BER 2020
SAN AN TON IO RIVER / SA N DY A N GLI N P H I LLI PS
Vol. 15 No. 10
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