Los Matachines De La Santa Cruz De La Ladrillera

Los Matachines de la Santa Cruz de la Ladrillera is a ritual dance troupe rooted in the Mexican American and U.S.–Mexico borderlands. The group traces its Holy Cross devotional tradition to Real de Catorce, a mining town in central Mexico during the colonial period. In the late nineteenth century, miners and their families relocated to coal mines near Dolores, Texas, on the Rio Grande, carrying the fiesta and dance practice with them.

When the coal mines closed in the late 1930s, many families moved to Laredo and settled near the brick factory in the La Ladrillera neighborhood. They established a shrine for the Holy Cross, anchoring the movement and religious commitment in community space. The troupe honors the Holy Cross on May 3 and the Virgen de Guadalupe on December 12, observances that can extend over three to five days and draw as many as fifty dancers at one time.

During these celebrations, dancers proceed from the neighborhood shrine through La Ladrillera to Holy Redeemer Catholic Church and back. The repertoire includes roughly twelve sones, including pieces associated with La Cruz, La encrucijada, and La Malinche y el Viejo. Movement, sound, and dress are inseparable: dancers carry sonajas and stylized bows and arrows; the nagüilla's reed-and-bell construction adds percussion to the body's motion. Drum and accordion are central to the music, with guitar appearing at times and violin in earlier practice. Members also prepare food and embroider the red vest and nagüilla. Many dance in memory of a person who has died or is ill, and some understand participation as a lifelong vow.

Public presentations have extended the group's visibility without replacing its devotional center. The troupe participated in the 1987 Smithsonian American Folklife Festival and the 1988 Texas Folklife Festival. In the 1980s, a Texas Folklife Resources apprenticeship grant supported intergenerational transmission, and in 1991 the Fiesta de la Santa Cruz was photographically documented by folklorist Norma E. Cantú.

In 2020, the National Endowment for the Arts named Los Matachines de la Santa Cruz de la Ladrillera a National Heritage Fellow, the United States' highest federal honor in folk and traditional arts. Current members descend from families including Ortiz, Liendo, Castillo, and Martínez. The troupe remains Laredo's oldest still-performing matachines group, and its survival depends on neighborhood stewardship and the commitment of successive generations.