Mickler's Floridiana

Mickler's Floridiana was a bookseller in Florida started by Thomas Mickler and Georgine Mickler. The couple also ran Mickler House, a small publisher, from their Chuluota, Florida home. They had the largest collection of books on Florida subjects (Floridiana). Some of Mickler's sermon collection now resides at the University of Central Florida Library as the "Thomas and Georgine Mickler Sermon Collection 1880-1933." Thomas Mickler was also an avid map collector. His collection spanned from 1735 to 1995, and covered lands and waterways beyond Florida, as well as providing a historical record of Florida's development.

Georgine Mickler was born in Chicago. She was raised by an aunt in Kentucky and had a hardscrabble life during the Great Depression. Her mother died when she was young. Her father, George Rumrill, was a famous potter in the 1920s. She was a photo illustrator in New York City and her work included photographs Jacqueline Bouvier (Jackie Kennedy). She moved to Florida in 1961. Thomas Mickler had a camera store in Orlando where the two met and fell in love. She established a part of the store for books and it grew. In 1963 the couple moved to Chuluota and set up shop in their home, the Florida Breeze, built by one of Henry Flagler's Florida East Coast Railroad agents in 1913. Its 11 rooms were eventually filled with books. Gov. Lawton Chiles visited. They also helped build St. Joseph's Catholic Church (Alafaya Trail).

The Mickler's did mail-order business as Mickler's Antiquarian Books for almost 40 years. They were skilled in obtaining out-of-print publications about Florida and collected more than 40,000 books and other historical pieces of paper memorabilia (known as ephemera, in the trade).

Thomas Mickler was a native Floridian. He died in 1997. Georgine Mickler died in 1998. Mickler's Floridiana was purchased by Waterview Press of Oviedo, Florida in 1999. When the estate was split up, six university libraries across the state of Florida, purchased materials, with University of Central Florida and the University of Florida obtaining the bulk of the collection. T. Allan Smith, from St. Petersburg, bought what remained of the couple's personal collection.

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