Carmen Bartlick clearly remembers March 31, 1995. She was in labor at McAllen Medical Center as she watched snippets of Yolanda Saldivar’s standoff with police on the television in her hospital room. Hours earlier, Saldivar shot and killed Selena Quintanilla Perez at a Corpus Christi motel as the tejano music superstar attempted to collect financial records.
Saldivar sat in her truck with a gun pointed at her head before law enforcement officials coaxed her to surrender.
In the early morning hours of April 1, Bartlick’s daughter, Eryn was born. Like many parents, Carmen and her husband bought a copy of the day’s newspaper and stowed it away with other keepsakes from Eryn’s birth.
"I thought, someday, she might want to know what was going on in the world the day she was born," Carmen said.
Carmen said she didn’t give the newspaper much thought after that.
Soon thereafter, the Bartlick family relocated to Sedalia, Mo.
When she was about four years old, Eryn and her thenseven-year old sister Hylari were flipping through radio stations when they stumbled across Selena’s English song, "Dreaming of You." A few days later, they heard it again.
"We liked the song a lot but we didn’t know who sang it," Eryn said. "My mom told us that it was Selena."
From that moment on, Eryn loved Selena’s music and wanted to know more about her. Carmen remembered that Selena was killed the day before Eryn was born and pulled out the old newspaper. The main headline of The Monitor’s April 1, 1995 issue read: Selena Slain.
Immediately following Selena’s death, many parents were compelled to honor her memory.
Between March 31, 1995 and March 31, 1996, more than 1,000 babies in Texas were named Selena, according to the Bureau of Vital Statistics.
The greatest testament to Selena’s influence, however, may be the countless number of children that never saw her alive or that are too young to remember her and adore her as they adore current artists. These children keep Selena CDs alongside those of Hilary Duff and Britney Spears.
Spanish music was hard to come by in Missouri but for one hour on Saturday afternoons, a radio station played tejano music. Eryn tuned in every week, hoping Selena’s music would be played. She eventually asked her parents to buy her Selena CDs.
Carmen said she was surprised that her daughter, who was just a preschooler at the time, was so taken by Selena.
"I think it’s kind of odd," Carmen said. "I was never a big fan myself. I didn’t have any of her CDs or anything. I don’t think we ever even mentioned Selena until the girls asked us about her."
Today, Eryn, now a fourth grader at De la Vina Elementary in Edinburg, keeps a large framed photo of Selena over her bed. A white rosary dangles from the right corner.
Eryn isn’t alone in her love for Selena. Selena’s legacy captured a new generations of fans. Legions of children listen to her music and watch the biopic of her life regularly.
Many of these same children also beg their parents to take them to Corpus Christi, Selena’s hometown, so they can visit the Selena museum and other landmarks.
Joseph Valdez, a public relations representative for QProductions, often gives guided tours through the Corpus Christi facility. Several scenes from Selena, the movie were filmed there, in a pink-walled studio.
Valdez said many young children recite lines from the movie verbatim when they walk through that room.
Eryn watched Selena, the movie many times on VH1 and after much pleading, she finally received her own copy for Christmas.
"I’ve watched it more than 80 times," Eryn said.
Jennifer Beltran, a seventh grader at De Leon Middle School in McAllen was just two years old when she attended a Selena concert at McAllen’s Municipal Park.
"It was her last concert here in the Valley," she said. "Even thought I was really young, I remember being there. I watched the concert sitting on my mom’s shoulders and Selena waved at me."
Now 12, Beltran said she started, "going through my mom’s stuff and listening to her Selena tapes," when she was very young.
New Braunfels resident Karen Gandy, 11, convinced her mother to take her to Corpus Christi on a recent day off from school. She stopped at the Selena museum and other locales.
Armed with a Selena T-shirt, Gandy walked out of Selena Etc., a boutique the singer opened shortly before her death.
Gandy said an uncle tuned her in to Selena’s music when she was very young.
"I just started liking her," Gandy said. "I like everything about her. She’s pretty and I like her music. She dresses cool."
Gandy’s mother, Bonnie, said her daughter has admired Selena for as long as she can remember.
"She started singing and dancing to Selena when she was four or five years old," she said.
Like Gandy, most children talk about Selena in the present tense.
"For these girls, Selena is frozen in time," Carmen said. "To them, she is alive."
Eryn also speaks of Selena in the same manner.
"When she wants to do something, she does it," she said. "That’s what I like the most about her."
"When we bring up the fact that Selena is dead, Eryn gets very upset," Carmen said.
Carmen said Eryn frequently listens to Selena’s CDs as she does her homework.
"She closes the door and sings along with the music," she said. "She doesn’t know Spanish, but she’s picked up the lyrics. There’s definitely a connection there."
Bonnie Gandy believes there will never be another artist like Selena, an artist whose fan base encompasses young children to the elderly and every age group in between, even a decade after her death.
"She touched millions of hearts," she said.
Beltran agrees.
"Selena had a very special gift," she said. "Nobody can come close to what she was and still is."
