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After the threat of the Cold War receded, the base was eventually declared surplus, but the field didn’t lie fallow for long.
“Someone very clever inserted language in the original documents that established a relationship between the city and county and the military. It said if the military abandoned the site, then the land and improvements would go back to the city and county,” Bryson explained.
This was invoked in 1963 when the Donaldson Center came under joint ownership of the city of Greenville and Greenville County. It is managed by the Donaldson Development Commission, a board of seven commissioners that governs the park and directs its mission. Initially, the commission worked quickly to set up all the utilities and purchase a right of way for the Southern Rail line. In less than six months, the entire property and its infrastructure, originally appraised at $10 million, was fully paid for.
Lockheed Martin Aircraft & Logistics Centers, the aerospace support arm of the Technology Services Business Area of the Lockheed Martin Corp. and one of the leading providers of government aircraft services and logistics solutions, is the largest resident of Donaldson Center. In the last five years, the company undertook a major expansion, opening a new four-bay, 107,000-square-foot maintenance hangar, which includes a 23,000-square-foot annex with associated support space, able to house four large multi-engine aircraft, such as the C-130 cargo aircraft or the P-3 maritime surveillance aircraft.
Developments like this are typical at Donaldson, Bryson said. He points out that Lockheed was originally Atlantic Aviation.
“Most of the big names came in and acquired smaller companies. 3M bought Olin and has grown ever since,” he said. Then there are the “real small engineering companies, warehouses and corporate hangars,” Bryson said, ticking off the businesses on his fingers. “But Stevens Aviation has their largest in the U.S. here.”
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