A Community Affair: The Fort Griffin Fandangle (August 4, 2025)
by Scott Sosebee
How would you tell the story of your city’s history if you had the chance? What medium would you use to relay your heritage to other people? As a historian, I suppose I would definitely choose to write it. I’m sure others of you might film a documentary, or perhaps chronicle the story in a work of art, such as a painting. If you were Taylor Sheridan, I suppose producing a fantastical and almost whimsical tale full of drama and unbelievable violence would be in order. But would you consider your paean to the past to be literally that—an outdoor musical extravaganza that calls for many in your town to join as volunteer actors and also to have audience participation portions? You would if you were Robert Edward Nail, Jr., an Albany native who created what had become known as the Fort Griffin Fandangle and this year has just concluded with its 82nd year of performances, which is every year since 1938, save for five years during World War II (the first performance after 1941 was in 1947), and also 2020 and 2021 went dark due to the COVID pandemic.
The origins of the Fort Griffin Fandangle did not suggest that it would become the long-running event that it has grown to be. Albany, Texas, a town of about 2,000 in Shackelford County just 34 miles northeast of Abilene, grew around Fort Griffin, one of the frontier forts established by the United States Army in 1867 to protect early residents from potential Comanche and Kiowa raids. Albany, established in 1873, was the more “respectable” of the towns around Fort Griffin, a rival to “The Flats,” a settlement more directly adjacent to Fort Griffin that had its fair share of saloons, brothels, and other establishments that tended to take root around places full of young men, such as army forts. The senior class of Albany High School, in 1938, decided as a senior project to stage an outdoor play to honor the history of the region. They approached Robert Nail, Jr., who was the high school’s speech teacher as well as a playwright to write their idea. He would also direct the effort. Nail titled the play “Dr. Shackelford’s Paradise,” named after one of the martyrs of Goliad and who the county was named for. That first performance was staged in the high school’s football stadium and was a fairly straight-forward narrative account—with music—of the city’s history from the period just before the founding of Fort Griffin to the present. The students were the actors and, by all accounts, it was well attended.
It must have also been well-received as Albany’s Chamber of Commerce—always on the lookout for ways to promote the city—asked the students and Nail to expand the cast and the script and stage it again. They responded with both, and with community volunteers now involved in many roles, the Fort Griffin Fandangle was born, with its encore performance coming in July. It got the name “fandangle” as organizers were looking for something that would help promote not only its historical nature, but tie it more directly to its period. “Fandangle” is a word used by cow hands of the cattle drive/ranching era for a fete that had music, dancing, and a “general good time.” Nail’s script was also much different than the usual fare at the time. Nail, a graduate of Princeton who came back to his native Albany to teach, wrote a historical tale using some of the words of its historical figures, but the direction of the action associated with those words was satirical, and acted out in a “lovingly” mocking tone. In other words, the Fandangle was not really meant to be a serious rendering of the past, although it was accurate.
The heart of the show was the musical score as written by Nail’s first assistant, Alice Reynolds. While the script of the Fandango is certainly important, Reynolds’ music was front and center as every scene in the play is set to music and it is the musical score that is the primary interpretation conduit to the audience. The performers also dance, and the steps are accurate to what would be done during the period depicted, and the music is reminiscent of authentic period pieces as well.
The show was a hit and the Chamber decided to stage it the next year as well. For the next four years, Nail and Reynolds wrote new scripts with a slightly different score. That first year told the story of the Native Americans in the area, the first settlers to the area, the establishment of the fort, and early pioneers of the area. For the second year, the duo took a different approach and told the story of Fort Griffin and Albany through the eyes of a young couple who both moved to the region with their family, meet, fall in love, marry, and then raise a family. The third year was all about Fort Griffin and The Flats, the rip-roaring, wild town and fort that sat all by itself on the frontier. The fourth version was even something else—the story of ranching in Shackelford County with an emphasis on those early families who established stock empires in the region.
The interruption of World War II served to somewhat cement the tradition of the Fort Griffin Fandango. The townspeople missed the production during those years, and it also hit home how important a preservation and celebration of the past is to the identity and spirit of a city and its people. Nail served in World War II and when he returned the city formed an association to stage and fund-raise for the production. Called the Fandangle Association and initiated in 1947, it still manages the production. Nail, and later others involved, would borrow a little from the past stories as well as add something new to produce a new version of the show each year. Nail established three rules for Fandango: first, anybody with ties to Shackelford County could be in the show; second, the show was to be publicized by word of mouth, not paid advertising; and third, it was for families and there would be no profanity or anything “objectionable” in the show.
Nail’s and Reynold’s and the Foundation’s formula must have worked as the Fandangle continues today. If you have seen it—and I remember seeing it as a very young child—then it is something that does not leave your memory. Is it the past as a professional historian would have written it? Probably not, exactly. Historian Fane Downs in an article in the West Texas Historical Association’s Yearbook in 1978 called the Fandangle “myth as reality.” Her article discusses how some myths of the period—such as the cattlemen’s virtue and love for the land made them caring stewards—are perpetuated by the Fandangle. I won’t quibble with Dr. Downs’ analysis, but there is also another point she doesn’t consider. The past as presented by the Fort Griffin Fandango may not be actual renderings of the past, but it is a tale that has become the memory of those who live in Albany, and that is important. How they saw it forms part of how the past is remembered. And, its also a dang good show.
The East Texas Historical Association provides this column as a public service. Scott Sosebee is a Professor of History at Stephen F. Austin State University and the Executive Director of the Association. He can be contacted at sosebeem@sfasu.edu or via www.easttexashistorical.org.