A heart attack and subsequent surgery leave the Mexican-American version of Santa Claus, known to generations of Texas children as Pancho Claus, unsuitable for this Christmas.
Still, members of Richard Reyes’ community have taken it upon themselves to organize toy drives — and even don his iconic look — to keep his spirit alive for his dozens of believers.
Wearing his signature red zoot suit and black fedora, Reyes, 73, has been delivering Christmas presents to low-income children in and around Houston for more than four decades. But the man behind the personality whose last name is pronounced ‘Clos’ has endured more than his fair share of hardships in 2024.
As Houston’s KHOU reports, Hurricane Beryl flooded his home in July. And then in November he had a heart attack, requiring double bypass surgery.
Reyes’ recovery from the surgery is expected to take several weeks, and he spoke to KHOU and other media about how he feared he would miss his goal of distributing 20,000 toys to children in the Rio Grande Valley in Houston and Texas .
“You realize you’re not Santa Claus and you’re not immortal,” Reyes told KHOU. “So you have to get back to reality.”
Reyes apologized on Facebook on Sunday for having to take a step back.
“I’m very sorry,” read a message attributed to Pancho Claus. The post described “three small tubes going into my neck, one pacemaker…in my left breast and of course the scar on the chest,” adding, “I was in a lot of pain.”
A post on Tuesday “another operation”.
Luckily for Reyes, his lament found its way back to a crew of little helpers, so to speak.
Organizers held two separate events the weekend after Thanksgiving designed to raise donations for those on Pancho Claus’ list.
At one of them, a pastor named Mike Gomez donned a zoot suit like Reyes’, adopted the nickname Paz – or Peace – Claus and took photos with children as volunteers collected donated toys.
“Man, the shoes are too big to fill,” Gomez told KHOU. But Gomez said he did his best to ease some of Reyes’ concerns because he wanted Pancho Claus to prioritize his health.
“Calm down, take it easy,” Gomez said of his message to Reyes. “Because [your] A legacy has been built and other people have stepped up.”
At the other event in support of Pancho Claus, Carrie Rosas said that collecting toys on Reyes’ behalf was not a sacrifice for her because “he set the standard for how important it is to give back to the children who need it” .
“Pancho Claus…came to my school when I was in elementary school,” Rosas said.
Historians say the concept of Pancho Claus originated during the Chicano civil rights movement, according to the Associated Press. Mexican American studies scholar Lorenzo Cano of the University of Houston told the AP that Chicanos north of the border seem to have an idea of him as they tried to “build a place and a space for themselves” in the 1970s.
At the time, the AP noted, there was also an increase in interest in Mexican art, the Cinco de Mayo celebration of a famous military victory over France on May 5, 1862, and Mexico’s Independence Day, observed annually on September 16 commemorated.
Pancho Claus usually has black hair and a matching beard or mustache. Sometimes he wears a serape, a poncho or – as Reyes preferred – a red zoot suit in the style associated with the Chicano movement.
As he once told the AP, Reyes was called as Pancho Claus in the 1980s as a result of his Hispanic heritage and his desire to work with at-risk, low-income children after his teenage sister was killed in a drive-by. to shoot.
It all started with writing a play that served as the Mexican-American version of ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas’ and eventually turned into the gift distribution that was a regular part of the holiday season in his part of the US.
However, Reyes has always been aware that something like Pancho Claus transcends any individual. And he said as much as netizens spread word of a GoFundMe campaign aimed at keeping his gift-giving mission alive — which as of Wednesday had raised more than $11,000 for charity.
“It takes hundreds of people – one monkey doesn’t stop a show,” Reyes told KHOU. “I want my community to know they are Pancho Claus, and I need them.”
