Joel Robbins is acutely aware there are people who don’t live in Aledo, yet they “know all about it.” Robbins is the Senior Pastor of Aledo United Methodist Church, a church that dates to the 1870s.
Those who don’t live here know Aledo as the place where a few years ago a handful of high school kids delved too deep in historical reenactment by holding a fictitious online “slave” auction of their black classmates. That made national news.
Not long after, a former AISD teacher sat on a Fort Worth jury involving a man accused of shooting a gun across the street into a kitchen, narrowly missing a woman and child. During voir dire, the ex-teacher said she used to live in Aledo and another woman commented the whole of Aledo was racist. Joel Robbins winces every time he hears about this Aledo, because he knows better.
Those who don’t live here know Aledo as the place where another high school student recently posted AI-generated nude pictures with real faces of fellow female students. The incident caused excruciating embarrassment for the women and made national news.
They also know Aledo as the place where, a few years ago, a parent from a neighboring town filed a bullying complaint after Aledo’s football team recorded a lopsided win against their son’s team. In what passes these days for investigative journalism, the national news debated the complaint with all its seriousness.
This is the first tale, of an Aledo full of undesirables, at least if you’re one of those who judge an entire community by a few of its teens and the overwrought behavior of a parent.
Then there is the Aledo where a group of high school teens recently took an out-of-town summer trip and tore up people’s homes. Even Robbins winced. Bet you haven’t heard the second tale of Aledo.
L-R Sydney Byrd, Claire O’Donald, Luke Brown assist and learn as Joel Robbins measures and cuts material.
The group drove to the upper Texas Panhandle, stopping in Perryton. Located on a wide spur of flat land, Perryton is surrounded by circular irrigated fields, grain storage bins, and grasslands further out where the range breaks into ravines.
According to Mayor Kerry Symonds, the tornado that swept through town last year hit the residents who could afford it the least. Most lacked insurance. Frustrated by FEMA rules (Perryton is too small to qualify for federal disaster aid), Symonds was thrilled to see the teens of Aledo descend on his town. A year later, housing continues to be in short supply and people are living in places most of us would shun. The teens of Aledo set to work tearing, prying, ripping, cutting, hacking concrete, and sawing. To rebuild, the old drywall and siding needed to be removed.
Shannon Reynolds organized the venture, found overnight lodging, arranging for meals — high schoolers tearing off things are ravenously hungry. David Sides planned the work, even hauling materials and tools from Aledo. Most of the other adults working side-by-side with the teens were parents of the kids. JoDee Lantz was a notable exception, who participated to better connect with her community.
Inexperienced in construction, teens from Aledo United Methodist having been trekking to storm-struck places like Perryton for decades, well before Aledo made the national negative news. Reynolds is one in a long line of exceptional youth leaders. Robbins, who wore his enthusiasm for the work on his dirt-stained work clothes, defies the trend of shrinking Methodist churches; his is one of the fastest growing in the country.
Wincing under the unrelenting sunshine, Robbins and the other adults worried about the kids collapsing in the hundred degree temps. They made the kids drink plenty of water, take breaks in the scant shade. Everybody worried about the clock. They were there to rebuild, and they only had a few days to do it.
Aiden Breaux, Will Byrd, Noah Chasteen, Ava Massacci, Marion Robbins, and Zach Tubbs shook off the ancient gypsum dust covering their clothes and hung new drywall and installed new flooring. Luke Brown, Sydney Byrd, Jillian Gibson, Jace Gustin, Claire O’Donald and Paxton Psencik pulled, pried, and jimmied old siding from the sides of a 1950s kit house and nailed new Hardieboard in its place.
The family living there lost more than their home in the tornado. They lost a child. Perryton rallied and installed a storm shelter in the backyard of their new residence. Brendan Sides, Brennan Rogers, Kellie Lambertson, Will Reid, and Sarah Tubbs cut and fit sheet siding to one house and painstakingly unbolted old metal siding from a 1970s mobile home before nailing on new boards. The kids worked alongside exposed, and frequently moldy, fiberglass insulation. Some of the studs were too rotten for a nail and the kids searched for better holds.
The inside kids stuck it out in the un-air-conditioned rooms, the outside kids stole a moment here and there in the ever-shifting shade of the house or a tree. Working together, they moved and climbed ladders to reach high places, they steadied ladders for one another, they operated power saws to cut the work pieces to shape, nailers to secure the new to the old.
The kids cut and fitted siding and drywall around doors and windows. They trimmed to accommodate off-kilter walls. They caulked and painted. And they worked, not banker’s hours, but full days. After three sweltering days, everyone was exhausted. Remarkably, amazingly, they did it without complaint.
They didn’t quit because they hadn’t finished. They went back for a frenzied final day to wrap it up. They worked so hard they barely had the strength to pack and load the ladders on the overhead racks.
A rare disappointment — the kids like to meet and learn about the people who live in the houses they work on. In one case, this didn’t happen, as the family justifiably stayed inside to avoid the intense heat. On the scorching days, the teens of Aledo worked in the oven-like exhaust of the window air conditioners.
In the first tale of Aledo, its teens wouldn’t travel to places like Perryton. They wouldn’t step away from their computers and out of their comfort zone, sweating buckets, getting grungy, repairing homes of people not their skin color. They wouldn’t care about others in need.
The teens of Aledo’s second tale, they’re a different story altogether. Just ask Mayor Symonds as he surveys Perryton’s houses which are better off than before.
Joel Robbins hears the teens of Aledo telling about their hard-won skills in building houses and lives. Just as with previous generations, he knows most will repeat next summer.
An edited version of this story appears in the Substack newsletter https://trialsbywriting.substack.com.
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