The journey to save historic conjunto dance hall Lerma's Nite Club
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Lerma's Nite Club received a fresh coat of paint and much more. Photo: Megan Stringer/Axios
Susana Segura celebrated countless birthdays at Lerma's Nite Club, the former conjunto music venue near Culebra Road and Zarzamora Street. One tradition involved pinning a $1 bill on the person for their birthday.
- "You know you're gonna have to give up a dollar if you go to Lerma's, or you might have to give up $3 because it's gonna be somebody's birthday," Segura tells Axios. "People would celebrate their anniversaries here. I remember a few funerals."
What's happening: After more than a decade of work by the Esperanza Peace & Justice Center to restore the building and affirm its historic status, Lerma's is open to the public again as a community space (but not a conjunto dance hall).
Why it matters: Hispanic heritage is underrepresented in buildings and monuments designated as historic across the country, says Segura, a project coordinator for the center. Even though the efforts to save the building landed Lerma's on the National Register of Historic Places in 2011, it took more time and money to rehabilitate the club.
- Less than 8% of U.S. landmarks represent the stories of minority groups, per a 2021 report from the Hispanic Access Foundation.
What they're saying: "We're all part of the conjunto music world and we're trying to keep this music alive," Segura tells Axios. "It's part of our history, our background, our tradition."
Details: A portion of the Lerma's building is finished and open to the public. Free, drop-in conjunto music classes are offered Thursday evenings.
- Bexar County is planning a BiblioTech, an all-digital public library, in the portion of Lerma's that is not yet completed.
Context: The neighborhood around Lerma's endured redlining and segregation for decades, and, as a result, has struggled to build generational wealth, Segura says. Lerma's allowed the community to play hard and connect after a day of working hard.
Flashback: Lerma's Nite Club closed in 2010 when the city shut down the entire building due to unsafe conditions and code violations at a dry cleaning business in the same building, per the Texas State Historical Association.
- The building was headed for demolition, but community members banded together and successfully pushed to achieve multiple historic designations and keep the building standing.
Zoom in: Lerma's was one of the longest continually running conjunto dance halls in Texas, dating to at least 1948. It appeared in the 1997 movie "Selena." A mural from the set is on display at Lerma's today.
- Conjunto music is hugely important to South Texas. It represents the blending of German, Czech, Polish and Mexican music unique to the region.
- "Anybody who's anybody in conjunto music played at Lerma's," Segura tells Axios.
The big picture: San Antonio residents aren't as connected to recent Mexican and Mexican American history since landmarks have disappeared and future generations are further removed from immigrant forebears, Graciela Sánchez, director of the Esperanza Peace & Justice Center, tells Axios.
- Most spaces devoted to conjunto music have shut down, Segura says, leaving people to find pop-up dance events at flea markets.
State of play: Restoring the building has taken so long in part because fundraising has been a challenge, Sánchez and Segura say. Esperanza's cost will total about $4.5 million, Segura says.
- "It takes 10-15 years to do a lot of what other people do quickly," Sánchez says. "Our community is poor, so it's not like I can go to the millionaires of the West Side to ask for money."
The bottom line: "It's a victory for us to have saved this building because it was against all odds," Segura says.