Florida Made Foods: A History And The Citrus Industry Today
The Heartbeat of Florida
If cattle ranching represents Florida’s working landscape, citrus represents Florida’s public image. Oranges are the state fruit. Orange juice is the state beverage. Citrus imagery appears on license plates and souvenir shelves, and orange blossoms still perfume springtime air. But the citrus story is not only symbolic. It is a long record of adaptation, disaster and reinvention.
Remnants of the once booming citrus industry are still visible, like this abandoned citrus operation in Volusia county. Photo by Roberto Gonzalez.
Early Spanish explorers, likely including Juan Ponce de León, plant the first orange trees near St. Augustine in the 1500s. Commercial production begins nearly 300 years later after the Civil War, when rail development allows growers to ship fruit across the country. By then, citrus is already embedded in Florida’s expansion story. Groves spread along waterways and rail lines. Communities develop around packing houses. A fruit becomes a reason to build, settle and invest.
Florida citrus is also shaped by freezes. The first “Great Freeze” in 1835 nearly wipes out groves, pushing growers to seek warmer sites. After Florida becomes the 27th state in 1845, new groves appear along the St. Johns River as pioneers settle in. By 1860, Leesburg emerges as the first citrus center of the state, shipping fruit packed by the Baer and Campbell Co. to markets by boat. Refrigerated railcars expand northern markets in 1866, and counties such as Marion, Ocala and areas around Orange Lake and Citra become notable citrus zones.
Top left to right: Juan Ponce de León; Gen. Henry Shelton Sanford; Dr. Walter T. Swingle; Dr. H.J. Webber.
Photos credits: Rabbit75_fot “Henry Shelton Sanford” by Mathew Brady Studio, active 1844 – 1894 is marked with CC0 1.0.; United States Library of Congress’s Prints and Photographs division
The industry’s innovation story includes recognizable names. In 1870, Gen. Henry Shelton Sanford moves to the Sanford area, buys groves and develops citrus varieties still grown today, including the Valencia orange. The Florida Fruit Growers Association forms in 1874, and later cooperative and exchange structures take shape, organizing production and marketing and helping growers face national competition.
Then the freezes return. In 1894 and 1895, the “Big Freeze” devastates the crop, reducing it by 97percent and inflicting a massive economic loss. Growers move south toward the Ridge District of Central Florida. Another freeze hits in 1899. Yet the industry recovers, and by 1950 Florida picks more than 100 million boxes of citrus. By 1970, that number reaches 200 million. In the modern era, citrus concentrates in the southern two-thirds of the peninsula where freezing temperatures are less likely, though Polk County remains the state’s top citrus-
producing county.
Citrus faces threats beyond weather. Disease pressure and pest threats shape the industry’s scientific infrastructure. Research efforts begin early, including USDA work in Eustis in the late 19th century by scientists such as Dr. Walter T. Swingle and Dr. H.J. Webber. Swingle’s breeding work helps introduce citrus hybrids such as the tangelo. The Citrus Experiment Station, established by the Florida Legislature in 1917, becomes foundational to ongoing research and industry survival.
Florida citrus also becomes an innovation engine in processing. In 1915, the first citrus processing plant in America opens in Haines City, selling grapefruit juice in glass bottles. Ideas emerge for using cull fruit and byproducts such as peel and seeds. Citrus pulp becomes a possible cattle feed. In later decades, changes in irrigation offer freeze protection, including micro-sprinkler systems identified in Lake Alfred in 1982 as effective protection from cold injury.
Photo courtesy Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services
Even with that history, Florida citrus is not frozen in time. It lives in family operations that evolve in response to pressure. Hollieanna Groves offers a snapshot of that reality. Founded in 1952 by Hollie and Anna Oakley, the operation shifts ownership in 1954 when Glenn Lingle purchases it. Lingle and his wife, Jane, raise four children and run the business as a family enterprise where the kids work from a young age. After Glenn’s death in 2015 and Jane’s death in 2024, the next generation, Kurt, Jason and Alinda, continues the work.
After more than 70 years, Hollieanna Groves shuttered its property on Highway 17-92, noting that its packing house, built in the late 1940s, serves the business well, but the industry faces serious challenges including citrus greening disease and hurricanes across the last two decades. Economic hurdles and generational realities also shape decisions. The family continues shipping citrus gifts through a partner, emphasizing that customers still receive “fresh from the grove” fruit.
Before its closure, residents would shop this retail market November – April each year. Photo by Catherine Walters.
In Central Florida, citrus remains both memory and daily life. A visitor can still find the taste of the state in a glass of juice at a bed-and-breakfast or a box shipped to a doorstep. The story’s tension is that citrus stays iconic even as it becomes harder to sustain. That tension is exactly why Florida-made food matters. It demands attention before it becomes only a brand.
For Orlando magazine readers looking to get hands-on, two classic spots deliver the full Florida experience. At Lake Mills U-Pick, rows of orange trees invite visitors to wander, pick, and taste fruit at peak ripeness. The scent of citrus hangs in the air, and the simplicity of twisting an orange from the branch never gets old. West of town, Showcase of Citrus offers a more expansive grove experience, blending U-pick fruit with old-school Florida charm. Families load bags, snap photos, and sample juice-sweet oranges straight from the tree. It’s an easy reminder that some of the best Orlando experiences aren’t attractions at all, just sunshine, soil, and citrus grown steps from home nearby.
