A New Mexico man with extensive experience in business and railroad historical preservation has been selected as the new Executive Director of the volunteer group that serves as the museum arm of the Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad.
The Friends of the Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad’s Board of Directors, on Friday, January 24, announced the hiring of Rick Marsden of Placitas as Executive Director, effective February 13. The hiring follows a month’s long search aided by a professional recruiter of executive talent.
Marsden will replace Tim Tennant, who is retiring after 20 years as the top staff official of the Friends, an Albuquerque-based non-profit organization with 1,906 members world-wide.
Marsden has been a Friends member since 2014 and has been an active volunteer with the Friends, working as a photo archivist and as an on-board host on special excursion trains. He has also volunteered with the New Mexico Steam Locomotive and Railroad Historical Society’s locomotive restoration project in Albuquerque. He is a past vice president with that society.
The Friends organization is a 501(c)(3) non-profit founded and formally established by Albuquerque Attorney Bill Lock in 1988.
Marsden will oversee the Friends’ office staff and helps coordinate the organization’s numerous volunteer activities, most of which are conducted along the railroad.
Friends volunteers’ work ranges from restoring wooden freight cars and structures at sites along the railroad to researching archival photos. Members also served as on-board docents on the railroad’s trains operating near-daily from late spring into late fall.
Friends Board Chairman Don Stewart said Marsden is well qualified to be Friends Executive Director thanks to his multifaceted corporate career and his extensive involvement in volunteering both for the Friends and with the Albuquerque locomotive restoration project.
Marsden has demonstrated energy and excitement, particularly with efforts to increase the Friends’ volunteer base and increase the Friends’ public profile, Stewart said. “He wants to be out there and talk with people.”
A railfan and a history buff, Marsden said the Friends’ historic preservation mission is important. “They’re helping keep history alive. It’s right up my alley.”
Friends volunteer work sites include the Albuquerque headquarters, a car-rebuilding site in Colorado Springs, and the railroad’s yards in Antonito, Colorado, and Chama, New Mexico, as well as along the rail line. Many volunteers also work remotely.
Purchased by Colorado and New Mexico in1970, the Cumbres & Toltec Scenic Railroad was formed from a surviving section of the Denver & Rio Grande Western Railroad’s narrow-gauge system constructed in the late 19th century.
Railroad personnel operate the Cumbres & Toltec’s tourist and excursion trains that travel 64 miles of track between the railroad’s operating bases in Antonito, Colorado, and Chama, New Mexico.
The railroad, a National Historic Landmark, was named after prominent scenic features –Cumbres Pass, located in Colorado and Toltec Gorge, located in New Mexico – along the route that crosses the state line numerous times through both alpine and desert terrain.