New Tumacacori manager settles in

Tumacacori—Lisa Carrico is the new manager at the Tumac‡cori National Historical Park, which has roots three centuries old.

Carrico succeeds Ann Rasor, who retired last year after 10 years at the park.

Jesuit Father Eusebio Kino, the revered Padre on Horseback, came to the Tumac‡cori area in 1691 and established a mission on the east side of the Santa Cruz River.

The old Spanish mission has been a U.S. national monument or park for almost a century.

Carrico is the daughter of a retired Park Service employee who once worked in Southern Arizona.

She came here from Big Bend National Park, a park of more than 100,000 acres in southwest Texas north of the Rio Grande.

Her father Jim was once stationed at Organ Pipe Cactus National Monument in western Arizona on the Mexican border.

She and brother and sister often lived with their family including mother Virginia in national parks.

It was this upbringing at sometimes remote locations, she said, that heavily influenced her to become a ranger.

“I’d never lived in a city until I went to college,” she said.

She’s an anthropology graduate from the College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Va.

Carrico has been at the Tumac‡cori park for about three and a half weeks, and she has gotten acquainted with the 12-person staff.

“Great” is how she describes the rangers and other employees.

The nearby small villages of Tumac‡cori and Carmen were once rather lonely places.

But Rio Rico to the south and Tubac to the north are growing.

The park now consists of 325 acres. When it was first created, it was just 15 acres and there were always concerns that people would start crowding it.

Congress expanded the boundaries in 2002 and some adjoining property was later purchased to complete the expansion.

“This a beautiful part of the world,” said Carrico in an interview Friday.

She added, “lots of people are attracted to it for the same reasons we are.”

The main feature of the park is the 19th century mission church, which was started by Franciscan missionaries.

Constructions went through several periods, both Spanish and Mexican.

The mission became part of the United States after the 1853 Gadsden Purchase. President Theodore Roosevelt made it a national monument in 1908.

There are two other nearby park sites, Guevavi and Calabazas. People who want to visit them have to participate in a special ranger-led tour.

Carrico got an idea of how popular the Tumac‡cori park is on Saturday, May 5.

More than 400 youngsters came to learn about the park, the outdoors and how to be Junior Rangers.

They studied the wildlife, hiked to the river, learned about the plants and other things. Their parents brought them.

“They started at 10 and some were here to the very end (4 p.m.),”, said new manager Carrico.

There will be a special welcoming event and installation ceremony for Carrico at 2 p.m. May 30.

jlamb@gvnews.com | 547-9749