Demetree, chairman, Demetree Builders Inc., Orlando, was selected for his years of service to the industry, the community and the state.

But a little-known item in Demetree's real estate career is that he and his local partners in 1965 sold the late Walt Disney the 12,400 acres in Lake Buena Vista, FL that became the Magic Kingdom, the hallmark of the 30,000-acre Walt Disney World attraction, 20 miles south of Downtown Orlando. The park opened in 1970.

The land was sold by two dozen individual owners for an average $200 per acre or less than one-quarter of one cent per sf, according to Orange County real estate records. Scarce undeveloped land in the immediate Disney area today goes for over $2 million per acre or about $46 per sf, industrial brokers intimate with the Lake Buena Vista submarket tell GlobeSt.com.