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1988 — 1997
The word was earned in a Federal Register notice: The "International" in Fort Wayne International is not only a marketing word. It rests on a federal designation that predates the name. By Treasury Decision 88-35, published in the Customs Bulletin of 6 July 1988 and effective 27 July 1988, the U.S. Customs Service designated the newly approved customs facility at Fort Wayne as a customs station, placed under the supervision of the Indianapolis port of entry in the Cleveland district, expressly to serve "a new user fee airport which is being established at Baer Field" — a user-fee airport being one approved to receive Customs officers to process aircraft entering the United States without itself qualifying as a full international or landing-rights airport. In 1991 the airport authority renamed Baer Field Fort Wayne International Airport on the strength of that international capability, keeping the man in the building: the terminal was renamed the Lieutenant Paul Baer Terminal. The decade then rebuilt the place — between 1994 and 1997 the terminal was expanded in the largest construction program in the airport's history to that date, designed by MSKTD & Associates, alongside runway upgrades and the Air Trade Center on the southwest side, a property that sits within a foreign trade zone with full-time customs in place. One stray date in the record is worth stating rather than smoothing: the News-Sentinel's history series, writing in 2000, dates the change "in 1992, for marketing purposes," where the authority's record and every reference built on it say 1991. This history follows the authority's 1991 and carries the newspaper's 1992 as the conflict it is. The customs footprint has since grown into the terminal era: the U.S. Customs office moved to a new location near the Aero Center in 2016, serving cargo and business aircraft, while a passenger customs inspection station remains a planned, unbuilt element of the master plan.
Sources:
- U.S. Customs Service, Treasury Decision 88-35, Customs Bulletin and Decisions, vol. 22, no. 27 (6 July 1988) — the Fort Wayne customs station, effective 27 July 1988, and the user-fee airport at Baer Field.
- Fort Wayne International Airport history record (airport authority) — the 1991 renaming and the Lieutenant Paul Baer Terminal; the 1994–1997 expansion.
- Airport magazine / Aviation Pros, "Ft. Wayne's air trade alliance" (April 2002) — full-time customs in place and the Air Trade Center within a foreign trade zone.
- The News-Sentinel, "Government built airport for city" — the 1992 marketing-purpose dating, carried as a conflict.
- FAA airport facility record for FWA (city-data compilation) — customs landing rights held; not an airport of entry.