How one MSU graduate is investing in the next generation of landscape professionals
Michael Hatcher’s grandmother told him any morning that begins with bubbles in your coffee is bound to be a good day, teaching him attitude is ours alone to establish. The practice, one he still follows, has helped him become his own success story while enjoying life along the way.
“She said, ‘Honey, when you pour that cup of coffee, if you see bubbles in that cup, you just remember it’s gonna be a good day,’” Hatcher said.
The 1982 landscape contracting and management graduate is the founder of one of the most successful landscaping firms in the South. He and his wife recently returned the investment made in him by Mississippi State University with the creation of the Michael L. and Mary B. Hatcher Endowed Professorship in the Department of Landscape Architecture and Environmental Design. The endowment supports outstanding faculty who prioritize environmental design systems in their research, teaching and contributions to the landscape architecture profession.
In the summer of 1976, a teenage Hatcher from Brookhaven boarded a bus bound for MSU, his first visit to campus. He had been selected to represent Lincoln County at a week-long horticulture seminar sponsored by the Garden Clubs of Mississippi. The program sent two students from each of the state’s 82 counties to MSU for a week of learning and exposure to the application of the science’s art. By the end of the week, he knew he’d found his calling in life. Nearly five decades later, he and his wife have created the first endowed professorship in the Department of Landscape Architecture and Environmental Design. His company, Michael Hatcher & Associates, based in Olive Branch just outside of Memphis, Tennessee, employs more than 600 people in Tennessee, North Carolina, Alabama and Mississippi.
The education Hatcher received at MSU, combined with the fellow alumni he has employed throughout the company’s history, has proven to be vital to its success.
“That really had a big influence on the gift because I realize the value the university provided for our growth,” he said. “Our company has employed more than 90 Mississippi State alumni in the 40 years we’ve been in business including both full-time and internship programs.”
Hatcher started working in what he now calls “the green industry” at age 14, at Brookhaven Nurseries. That experience, along with the week-long horticulture visit to MSU at age 17, set him on his path. He pursued landscape architecture, then transferred into the landscape contracting and management program, which included classes in accounting and business law.
He says now those business courses proved to be among the most valuable subjects he learned at MSU. Although he never became an accountant or an attorney, understanding the language of finance and knowing when to seek qualified legal counsel became foundational to building a successful enterprise. He graduated in 1982 and soon arrived in Memphis shortly afterward with a stack of resumes and a maroon pick-up truck.
Memphis, as it turned out, was simply the city close enough to home that felt big enough to offer opportunity and the potential to feel like a second home to him. He knocked on doors, found work, and by 1986 had launched a landscape contracting business on his own. His wife Mary joined the company in 1990, the same year they hired their first MSU landscape architecture graduate, a moment Hatcher describes as something of a turning point.
“As MSU’s Department of Landscape Architecture and Environmental Design continues to grow, I often think back on my time as a student,” Hatcher said. “I’ve watched the department evolve and strengthen, and our company’s success is deeply tied to that journey. When Mary and I discussed a gift with the MSU Foundation, establishing an endowed professorship felt natural.”
The steady pipeline of MSU-educated talent, he says, is a direct reason the gift felt not just appropriate but necessary. Staying close to the university shaped both the company’s culture and its growth, and Hatcher wanted to give something back that would sustain that relationship for generations to come.
The inaugural holder of the professorship is SaMin Han, an assistant professor in the department whose research and writing center on climate resilience, environmental planning, and community-centered design. Her research has appeared in highly ranked international journals and has been supported by external funding from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine Gulf Research Program.
She teaches undergraduate and graduate-level studios and courses in grading for construction, watershed management and proposal writing.
“This is an honor I receive with deep gratitude and humility, and I am committed to building a strong and thoughtful foundation that carries forward the Hatchers’ legacy within and beyond our department and university,” Han said.
Department head Anne Spafford described the Hatchers’ gift as “monumental in rewarding and supporting faculty in continuing their impactful work in the classroom and in communities across Mississippi,” and noted the department’s enthusiasm at receiving its inaugural endowed professorship.
For Michael Hatcher, the most important elements remain, at heart, the people their gift will touch. He stepped into a founder’s role at his company about 18 months ago, leaving day-to-day operations to others but remaining a visible presence. He tells students today to “think bigger than they can imagine,” because “the future is a big place.”
Hatcher refers frequently to a motivational novel written by his friend, Jim Paluch.
“Five Important Things,” published in 1996, connects setting goals, continuing to learn, appreciating people, choosing your attitude, and not quitting. It is a formula that has helped guide Hatcher and his company well along its way.
Remembering his grandmother’s words, Hatcher intentionally pours his coffee every morning in a way that leaves bubbles, choosing his attitude. That way, he’s making certain he’ll see good things ahead. Thanks to the Michael L. and Mary B. Hatcher Endowed Professorship, today’s students will be seeing them too.
By Anna Welborn and Kevin Tate, Photos by University Photographers & Submitted