Last summer, I met with guest editor Roberto José Andrade Franco and photographer Christ Chávez at Taconeta near downtown El Paso. Over carnitas and fish tacos, the pair spent the better part of two hours filling me in on their hometown: the popular restaurants and shops often missed by tourists, a resurgence happening in the Mission Valley area, the many sites of historical significance and local lore, and the artists and entrepreneurs creating spaces for community and entertainment. The duo’s combined nine decades living in the city and encyclopedic knowledge of its culture could have filled a year’s worth of issues.
Consider this an insider’s primer to the dynamic border town—one infused with pride for a city that can be enigmatic to outsiders but seeps into the bones of those who call it home. It’s a place deeply influenced by Mexico, Franco says: “Our history is closer to the Mexican Revolution than it is to Texas’ revolution, so we grow up hearing, and even seeing, stories of Pancho Villa more so than Davy Crockett.” The writer, who has lived in El Paso since he was 5, is now raising his daughter there alongside both his and his wife’s families. Growing up, his favorite sight was the Sunbeam Bread sign he’d spot while traveling over the Cotton Street Bridge on his way to visit his great-grandmother in Segundo Barrio.
The neighborhood, a hub of art and vibrant immigrant culture that’s listed in the National Register of Historic Places, is mentioned frequently in this issue. It was also a favorite area of beloved El Paso author Benjamin Alire Sáenz, who died at 71 on July 28 while finishing this issue’s Open Road essay, “My Finest Mentor.” Franco met Sáenz last October at his century-old house, where they talked for an hour about writing, all the things they loved about El Paso, his dogs, and the aforementioned essay. Sáenz was already ailing then, choosing to forgo medication that eased his pain but left him unable to write. His irrepressible love for his craft and his city reverberates in his last piece, one we’re both proud and heartbroken to publish.
On the way home from El Paso last summer, my daughter read Sáenz’s best-selling young adult novel, Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe. The book was the first novel she truly loved. She quickly devoured the sequel and passed it along to me to read. In the book set in the border town, Sáenz writes of the power of storytelling: “Maybe all we were meant to do on this earth was to keep on telling stories. Our stories—and the stories of people we loved.”
