Re: Denver CBS covers D&S snow removal

Brian,

When we ran the "Rotary Snow Plow Passenger Extra" May 4,5 1991 my wife Veronica arranged for it to be filmed by Bob McNamara from CBS news. It was shown nationally on the "Evening news with Dan Rather", and on the "Early Show". The cost of running the OY was assumed by Kyle railways. The revenue from ticket sales went to the "Friends of the C&TS". The event boosted membership in the Friends and supplied a sum of money which helped defray the cost of bringing the tank cars down from Alaska.

We could have cleared the line with a caterpillar but it would not have gotten us on national TV. The piece ran about two and a half minutes and showed twice. We figured it was about 2 million dollars worth of free advertizing. If I recall correctly in the years 1990 thru 1996 ridership grew from 50,000 to just under 60,000.

By the way all the locomotives, caboose, and rotary were lettered Cumbres & Toltec.

John Bush

P.S. If I can figure out how to get the news clip off of VHS and on to youtube I will post it.