LAKELAND, Fla. (Nov. 4, 2010) -- On Monday, Nov. 15, Florida Southern and the City of Lakeland Beautification Board will dedicate The Thomas Mack Park, named for a beloved and longtime professor of citrus at the College. The dedication ceremony begins at 4 p.m. on the shore of Lake Hollingsworth between Johnson and Melton Avenues. The public is invited.

Mack taught at Florida Southern from 1951 to 1998, and he also served as the City of Lakeland's landscape architect from 1960 to 1970. He published hundreds of articles and two books on the citrus industry. He also was a passionate collector of photography, books, historical records, crate labels, and films about citrus. In 1997, he was inducted into the Florida Citrus Hall of Fame for his many contributions to the industry.

In 2001, a Florida House of Representatives resolution declared that his collection of citrus ephemera would become the state's official archives of the citrus industry. Today, the Florida Citrus Archives are housed in FSC's Sarah D. and L. Kirk McKay, Jr., Archives Center.

Mack died in 2004 at the age of 90.