Fairfield Arts & Convention Center

Fairfield Arts & Convention Center

Fairfield is a city in, and the county seat of, Jefferson County, Iowa, United States. It has a population totaling 9,464 people according to the 2010 census. It is a Midwestern city surrounded by rolling farmlands filled with corn, soybean, cattle and hogs with a median family income of $46,138 (10% of families below the poverty line). The city became the county seat in 1839 with 110 residents and grew to 650 by 1847. Its library was established in 1853 and it held its first fair in 1854. Early architecture includes work by George Franklin Barber and Barry Byrne, who trained under Frank Lloyd Wright.

The city has an “abundance of start-up companies” and has been called "one of the state's economic superstars". It has received The Grassroots Rural Entrepreneurship Award, been nicknamed “silicorn valley” and was featured in a 2012 episode of the TV show, Oprah's Next Chapter. It has been the home of Maharishi University of Management (formerly Maharishi International University) since 1974 and has been referred to as "the world's largest training center" for practitioners of the Transcendental Meditation technique. The city includes the $6 million Fairfield Arts & Convention Center (FACC), built in 2007. In 2010, it was named one of six Iowa Great Places.

The city has 12 public parks and recreation areas consisting over 1,300 acres and is governed by a seven-member city council. The Fairfield Community School District is home to nearly 2,500 students, teachers, administrators and staff, with three elementary schools, a middle school, and a high school. The city has two private schools, Maharishi School of the Age of Enlightenment and Cornerstone Primary School. Fairfield has its own municipal airport, several radio stations, a local television station and a daily newspaper. Its notable past and current residents include folk musician Greg Brown, actor Ben Foster and physicist John Hagelin.