LECTURE FOR AUGUST 2nd, 2025
2:00 PM - Kit Carson Coop Board Room

NEW MEXICO RAILROAD'S
"STEEL GANGS"

by Fred Friedman

Navajo, Laguna, Taos and other Native American railroad workers have been an important element of railroad track construction and maintenance since 1880. Railroad company supervisors have called them the best railroad workers in the business. The history of these men begins with the Navajo Treaty of 1868 and concludes with a congressional resolution lauding the work of these special people.

Each gang retained their own tribal and Pueblo cultural elements, as they built & maintain tracks for the Union Pacific, Atchison, Topeka & Santa Fe and other national systems.

Some workers established villages along the trains’ route. Today, many Native people work at highly technical jobs with the Burlington Northern Santa Fe, the Union Pacific and other national carriers. The story of native people's association with the Iron Steed is a fascinating, although little known one.

Fred Friedman has an extensive background in New Mexico railroad history, having managed the New Mexico Railroad Bureau for almost 30 years, while dealing with a variety of rail freight, passenger & regulatory subjects. Thereafter, he was retained by several law firms as an expert witness and investigator of railroad accidents throughout the country. Fred has written and lectured on railroad topics, from both territorial and statehood periods, dealing with railroad law, labor issues, line closings and the personalities involved in those matters.

Speaking Topics

• Native American Railroad Workers, Their History & Legacy
• What’s Going on with Amtrak?
• A History of New Mexico’s Railroads from Territory to Statehood

The Taos County Historical Society is a 501(C)(3) non-profit organization founded in 1952 and dedicated to the recording and preserving of the irreplaceable in Taos County.
Membership is open to anyone upon payment of dues.
For additional information on the programs, activities and history of Taos visit the Society's website at www.taoscountyhistoricalsociety.org

Mil Gracias, A THOUSAND THANKS, does not begin to cover the many, many individuals to whom we owe a debt of gratitude. This debt is not only the living but also to those men and women who long ago began to preserve the journals and documents we now depend upon for knowledge of the past: the chroniclers who accompanied the explorers and settlers and who, dusty, tired and hungry, sat in the light of a candle to record in their journals the events of the day and the Franciscan clerics who made detailed reports of their canonical visits to the mission churches of Nuevo México.

Corina A. Santistevan
Acknowledgements in "Taos: A Topical History"