Keystone Central Foundation Hall of Fame inductees’ event set for Feb. 18; William Rishell among new class

BALD EAGLE TOWNSHIP, PA – The Keystone Central Foundation this month announced the six members of its 2023 Hall of Fame class. They will be recognized at the organization’s hall of fame induction ceremony on Saturday, Feb. 18 at the Central Mountain High School cafeteria.
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The Record and therecord-online will be running periodic stories on the new inductees in the weeks leading up to the Feb. 18 event. Among the inductees is William Rishell, Bald Eagle-Nittany High School, Class of 1958.

The Keystone Central Foundation provided this information on inductee Rishell:

William A. Rishell is a 1958 graduate of Bald-Eagle Nittany High School. He is retired as Vice President and Director of Research from Arbor Acres Farm Inc., Glastonbury, CT.

He was born in 1940 and grew up on a farm in Mackeyville where he learned the value of hard work. While a student at BEN, he was the President of Student Council and Vice President of the Senior Class. He was a member of the National Honor Society, Key Club and Varsity Club. He was a four-year starter for the Panther football team and served as co-captain his senior year. Mr. Rishell was also a two-year starter on the BEN wrestling team and was awarded a partial athletic scholarship to the University of Maryland.

While in college, he received his BS in Poultry Science and was elected to Omicron Delta Kappa, a national leadership honorary society and was the winner of Danforth Foundation Scholarship for outstanding senior in agriculture.

At the University of Maryland, he was also a varsity letterman for 3 years on the wrestling team and was the Atlantic Coast Conference Wrestling Champion at 177 pounds for two years. He was a member of the University of Maryland football team for two years and was a member of the Varsity “M” Club.

After receiving his undergraduate degree in 1962, he went on to Iowa State University and received his master’s degree in Poultry Genetics and his PhD in Poultry Breeding and Genetics with minors in Immunology and Genetics.

From 1967 until his retirement in 1997, Mr. Rishell worked across the country and traveled more than 30 countries as a geneticist and director of research in poultry sciences.

In his professional career, he holds many achievements. He personally directed the mating/selection schemes for commercial breeding products. As a result of his work, Arbor Acres, the company he worked for at that time, achieved a four-fold increase in the worldwide market share while profitability increased approximately 300 times during his tenure as director. He also worked on a joint venture with Amgen in transferring foreign genes into the germline of experimental chickens and have those genes expressed in succeeding generations. It was considered a scientific success.

Mr. Rishell is a past member of the National Breeders Program Committee; former editor of the Proceedings of National Breeders Roundtable; former chair of the National Breeders Roundtable and GT Systems Institutional Biosafety Committee. He was also the Genetic Advisor to Colorado Quality Hackles. He served as a youth coach for baseball, football, wrestling and softball.

He has been married to the former Constance Ake for 62 years and has two children and 5 grandchildren. In retirement, he has fished salmon, trout and halibut in Alaska and has caught more than 12 species of game fish off Florida’s coast. He has traveled by motor home to all 49 continental states and 6 Canadian provinces. He has traveled to more than 200 Penn State football games and has made an effort to attend all of his grandchildren’s sporting events. He also enjoys landscaping and vegetable gardening and is a member of the Wapping Community Church is South Windsor, CT.

Other foundation 2023 inductees are:

Mary Louise Ilgen, Sugar Valley High School, Class of 1943
Robbie Gould, Central Mountain High School, Class of 2001
DuWayne Kunes, Bald Eagle-Nittany High School, Class of 1976
Dennis “Jack” Royer, Bald Eagle-Nittany High School, Class of1958
Thomas “Doc” Sweitzer, Lock Haven High School Class of 1971.