Contact: Phil Hearn
STARKVILLE, Miss.--A retired California architect plans to donate 15 acres of land to Mississippi State for a research facility that could serve as the centerpiece for broader commercial development at the site near the Golden Triangle Regional Airport.
Wayne Fishback of Semi Valley, Calif., a facility planning and design specialist throughout his 40-year career, has signed a memorandum of understanding with the university. It confirms his intention to give MSU land north of the airport and on the western side of Airport Road near the Highway 82 interchange.
Fishback owns an adjacent 285 acres that he hopes to develop for light industry, professional buildings, restaurants, services stations, retail shops and other commercial uses in the area about midway between Starkville and Columbus.
"I believe Mississippi State represents the kind of quality that will act as a catalyst for more development," Fishback said during a recent visit to the state. "I would like to emulate the symbiotic relationship here that exists between Stanford University and the Silicon Valley in California. It will be good for MSU and a big attraction for business."
MSU research vice president Colin Scanes said it is too early to determine exactly what kind of university facility would be located at the site, but predicted it likely would be linked to aerospace engineering and defense-related research.
American Eurocopter and Aurora Flight Sciences are other high-tech, defense-related companies already operating near the airport site. Both have strong links to MSU's Bagley College of Engineering, led by Dean Kirk Schulz; the department of aerospace engineering, headed by Tony Vizzini; and Raspet Flight Research Laboratory, directed by David Lawrence.
"Mr. Fishback has a vision for development of this land and we want to help make his vision a reality," said Scanes. "We want to continue to play a pivotal role in the economic development of the Golden Triangle.
"We believe the MSU research facility can serve as an anchor for the development of private business in the future," he added.
As a senior partner at Schmidt, Garden and Erikson in Chicago and a partner in Chicago of Design, Fishback successfully practiced architecture and managed offices in Chicago, New York, Los Angeles and Hong Kong during his lengthy career, including projects in 22 states and 11 foreign countries.
Until 1994, he was a principal with B.T.A Architects and Planners in Los Angeles, where he was responsible for such major clients as Stanford University and City of Hope National Cancer Center in Duarte, Calif. During the past several years, he has provided consulting services to healthcare organizations in southeast Asia.
Although he has never lived in Mississippi, Fishback said his late parents, Dr. Woodson and Mildred Fishback, resided in Columbus for a decade during their retirement years. A late aunt who worked in real estate, Lucille Garton, also a resident of Columbus at the time, tipped him off about the then-available land near the airport.
"I had been doing some work around the research triangle in the Raleigh-Durham, N.C., area, in 1980 and was passing through Columbus to visit my parents," he recalled. "My aunt called me and asked me to look at a piece of property.
"I did and it struck me that the site had a lot of potential," he said. "I didn't quite envision that it would take 25 years for this (planned development) to evolve--but, as they say, better late than never."
For more information, contact Dr. Scanes at (662) 325-3570 or scanes@research.msstate.edu.