The Bandera Gunfighters Face a Succession Crisis

The key to a convincing death is to be strategic about it, although the Bandera Gunfighters can’t resist some comedic or dramatic flourishes. “Die big, die wide,” one of them tells me.On a gloomy morning in February, four of the gunfighters are resting their trigger fingers after finishing their first show of the day. Weather permitting, they perform twice on Saturdays behind the Bandera County Convention and Visitors Bureau, re-creating a shoot-out from the late 1800s (they use blanks). The building itself, made of rock with a sloping tin roof, dates to 1870. On one side of the courtyard are bleachers where visitors watch the performance, and on the other is Rattlesnake Ridge, a replica of an Old West town that includes a saloon, a…

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