Richard Park, IV

Dr. Richard Avery Park IV, age 82, of Diamondhead, passed away January 27, 2021 in Biloxi.

Richard is survived by his wife Darlene; his daughters Leigh Park of Diamondhead, and Holly Park of Penn Valley, CA; his sisters, Beverly (John) Sullivan of Marion, AR, and Candace (Thomas) Garrett of Grenada, MS; and several cousins, nieces, and nephews.

He was the son of the Rev. Richard and Lois Park and grew up in Hattiesburg. Dr. Park earned a BS in Geology from Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, and MS and PhD in Geology with a minor in Plant Ecology form the University of Wisconsin, Madison. He was a professor at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, Troy, NY, where he was Director of the Center for Ecological Modeling, and Associate Director of the Fresh Water Institute on Lake George. Richard was Coordinator of Institute Projects at Holcomb Research Institute, Butler University, Indianapolis, and visiting professor at the School for Public and Environmental Affairs, Indiana University, Bloomington. Richard left academia in 1993 to be a full-time consultant, first at Abt Associates, Bethesda, MD, and then as president of Eco Modeling, which in 2000 he moved to Diamondhead, where he also was affiliated with the University of Southern Mississippi at Stennis Space Center. He had an active consulting practice right up to his death at age 82. He was a charter member and vice president of the International Society for Ecological Modelling and was a character member and Councilor-at-large for the International Association of Landscape Ecology.

A colleague characterized Dr. Park as “a true scholar whose body of work spans such an extensive breadth of scope, and yet reveals an ever-increasing level of intricacy.” As a high school senior, he won first place in the State Science Fair with his fossil exhibit. As an undergraduate he was a National Science Foundation Fellow, doing field work in northern Mexico and writing a senior thesis in which he demonstrated the close relationship between fossils in Mexico and northern Africa several years before continental drift was generally accepted. Also, an undergraduate he worked as a “bug scout” in cotton fields of Arkansas, where in 1960 he was the first to calculate and report the ratio of beneficial to harmful insects as an indicator of when to poison; the ratio was adopted by the State Entomologist and became an important index in integrated pest management. Starting in 1970 he coordinated development of one of the first aquatic ecosystem simulation models as an initiative in the International Biological Program, and subsequently he applied the model to a number of lakes in Europe. Several years later he coordinated development of one of the first models to predict the fate of organic pollutants in aquatic ecosystems. The culmination of his long-term model development goal was the unique ecotoxicological AQUATOX model, which is used around the world to predict the effects of pollutants on pond, river, lake, and coastal ecosystems; at present it is being used by the Mississippi Department of Environmental Quality in damage assessment of the BP oil spill. At the same time, his SLAMM model, which predicts the impacts of global warming on coastal areas, is being widely used to prepare for sea-level rise; for example, the Fish & Wildlife Service and Ducks Unlimited are using it to determine what areas need to be purchased now in order to allow future shoreward migration of wetlands.

The family would like to thank the staff of Brookdale Senior Living and Southern Care Hospice for their care of Dr. Richard during this time.

An outdoor committal service will be held at a later date at St. Thomas Episcopal Church, Diamondhead.

RIEMANN FAMILY FUNERAL HOME, 9113 Kiln Delisle Rd., Pass Christian is serving the family. An online guestbook may be signed, and condolences and photos shared at www.riemannfamily.com.