Thomas A. “Tomás” Romero was sometimes described by colleagues as “a heart that walked on legs.”
“Because it’s as if there were nothing else of him except a big heart,” said María Martínez, executive director of El Museo Cultural de Santa Fe, where Romero served as board president until his death.
Following a February cancer diagnosis, Romero, an advocate for cultural preservation in Santa Fe, Rio Arriba and Taos counties, died March 12 at age 75.
His passing was a sudden shock to many of the Northern New Mexicans who came to know him through his work with El Museo Cultural and the federally designated Northern Rio Grande National Heritage Area.
“It was extremely quick,” said his son Adrian Romero, a musician in New York. “He was diagnosed and shortly thereafter he began treatment, but it was too far along.”
Tomás Romero was one of six children born to Ignacio and Eliza Romero in Santa Rosa. In a 2019 issue of Taos-based cultural magazine Land Water People Time, which he helped establish, he described himself as a descendant of 17th-century Spanish settlers.
The family lived in an all-adobe home built by Ignacio Romero off St. Michael’s Drive in Santa Fe, where amenities like plumbing and mail delivery were scarce.
Tomás Romero completed seminary studies in Cincinnati as a teenager but returned to New Mexico to pursue an accounting degree at the former Santa Fe College, where he graduated magna cum laude.
He would later bring his savvy in finance, accounting and systems to El Museo Cultural and the Northern Rio Grande National Heritage Area, which encompasses eight of the state’s 20 pueblos, the downtown Santa Fe area and hundreds of other historic sites.
Romero also ran a consulting practice and worked with two international firms.
Romero became involved with El Museo in 1998 and was integral to helping transform the old warehouse into what is now the Railyard District into the nonprofit cultural hub it is today.
“Museo would not be here without him,” said Martínez, who worked closely with Romero for years.
She added: “He did not use that first-person singular. It was a ‘we,’ and it was an ‘us.’ “
Romero spent part of the 1970s in La Paz, Bolivia, where he exhibited his own art and traveled across South and Central America. In 2020, he told an interviewer at El Museo that during his travels, he felt a “soulful reintegration” with “the language, our history and heritage, and the mix of cultures within the Latin American culture.”
He also worked for the state of New Mexico and held an associate vice president role at Santa Fe Community College.
In 2019, Romero retired from a near-decade stretch as director of the national heritage area.
“He was a very curious combination of many things,” Adrian Romero said. “He had the financial background, he had the managerial grasp and was very artistic, a great singer and had some talent with visual arts.”
Above all, his colleagues said, elevating the history of the Northern New Mexico region and its many cultures — he liked to disrupt the common narrative of Santa Fe’s “tricultural heritage” by saying there were “43 different cultures” — what his life’s calling.
Romero, who had an elaborate signature and deliberate demeanor, was known to carry a large brown accordion folder around with him.
“There was a sense that even if he just bumped into you, he was going to have a project or an idea to talk to you about, and then he would have the corresponding documents to show you,” said State Higher Education Deputy Secretary Patricia Trujillo, a former National Heritage Area board member.
Trujillo and Romero teamed up on several projects showcasing the complicated and unique history of Northern New Mexico. One presentation explored the lives of Hispanic and Native American workers on the Manhattan Project.
Another, Trujillo said, tackled the contentious life and times of Spanish conquistador Juan de Oñate.
“I would definitely say Tomás was a cultural convener,” she said. “He did want to have the hard dialogues, but with respect to people.”
His colleague, Pecos National Historical Park Superintendent Karl Cordova, described Romero as an even-keel, patient leader passionate about getting youth in Española and Santa Fe excited about their heritage.
“He was a master at working with people; he always had a subtle sense of humor,” Cordova said.
Trujillo said there is nary a cultural or environmental project in Northern New Mexico without Romero’s fingerprints on it still today.
“For him, it was almost vocational. He was called to do it,” she said.
In April, a celebration of his life will take place at El Museo Cultural. He is survived by his three sons, Chris, Curtis and Adrian, and his wife, Luba Kruk, 71.
Freelance writer Gwen Albers contributed to this report.
Comments are closed.