Alexander J Nowak
Silence Speaks
Heavy Sleeper
About
This is where Chepita was hanged, he claims. He points to a dense forest of mesquite trees. According to Jon, it's 80 yards across the field. 
No one has set foot on this place for decades, and the elderly woman who lives here has left Chepita’s resting place to the wilderness. But there is nothing to see. 
Bare meadows, no grave and no memento.

Like in a biblical scenario, history was erased here. The sparse documentation was destroyed by a tornado in the 1950s and a major fire in the years that followed. 
This place does not tell of present-day life, but of being forgotten and the severity of finitude.

Jon and I drive on, following the Road of the Headless Horsemen. Pastures and abandoned houses flicker by, now fenced off and awaiting demolition. 
Soon, the drills will arrive to claim the oil and the water beneath.

It feels as though the earth is being asked to surrender its last secrets.

                                                                                                                                                                                                                    
                                                                                                                                                                                                                        ’God bless Texas.’










Coyotes yelp and rattlers coil
Native Mexicans on alien soil.
Thorny cactus with yellow blooms
Sturdy mesquite with lacy plumes.
Men who killed for golden loot
Relentless posses in hot pursuit.
The traveling judge will appear
Trials and hangings twice year.










The Owl hoots from his oaken perch
With sleepless eyes that wake the night.
The coyotes yelp in endless search
Of stolen food, then run in fright.
The Mexican dove’s contralto note
Comes in mournful and remote.
Wierd are the winds that restless blow
Carrying secrets none will know.

from ‘Silence Speaks for Love, The Story of Chepita Rodriguez’ - Rachel Bluntzer Hebert












The tragedy surrounding the Mexican woman Chepita Rodriguez is still a local horror story in the small town of St. Patricio in southern Texas. Because of her, St. Patricio is said to be one of the most haunted places in the United States. The details of the story can be pieced together from older archive material and sources provided by local residents. As the first woman to be sentenced to death in the state of Texas, on Friday 13th in 1863, her story still serves as a blueprint for female lynchings in different contexts of varying degrees of seriousness.

In these times of political silencing and repeated attempts to reinterpret or even forget historical events, Chepita's story stands as a local example of historical inaccuracy and identity politics. The actual facts surrounding her death and her life before that are unknown due to a lack of documentation. However, the mystification of her death is still an ongoing process. Feeling anchored in one's geographical homeland is part of collective and individual identity formation. The connection to the past therefore also contributes to an understanding of the land we inhabit. This rootedness gets visible by looking at the contribution of culture forming institutions like church and people's heritage. Chepita's story and the associated efforts to preserve its details are a resounding appeal not to forget history and, more importantly, not to allow history to be rewritten.

Local stories disintegrate over time, leaving behind only a patchwork of opinions. Stories shape, define boundaries, and are in flux.
They follow an agenda of belonging. Nothing says as much about things as silence, and silence encourages injustice.







Espy Project Execution Records