The Citronaut was the first mascot of Florida Technological University (FTU), which later became the

University of Central Florida The University of Central Florida (UCF) is a public research university whose main campus is in unincorporated Orange County, Florida. UCF also has nine smaller regional campuses throughout central Florida. It is part of the State University ...

(UCF). The mascot appeared on the first student handbook in 1968–1969. After one year, students petitioned the university's student government to establish a new mascot for the university. In 1970, students approved "Knights of the Pegasus" as the second official university mascot, which remains to this day (albeit after being simplified to "Knights").

History

The Citronaut was designed by Norman Van Meter, the brother-in-law of FTU's then-president Charles N. Millican in an attempt to combine the two major themes of Central Florida at the time: the

citrus industry Citrus production encompasses the production of citrus fruit, which are the highest-value fruit crop in terms of international trade. There are two main markets for citrus fruit: * The fresh fruit market * The processed citrus fruits market (ma ...

, and the

space program A space program is an organized effort by a government or a company with a goal related to outer space. Lists of space programs include: * List of government space agencies * List of private spaceflight companies * List of human spaceflight prog ...

. Florida produces approximately 100 million boxes of citrus annually, and FTU was founded in 1963 to provide personnel to support

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the US federal government responsible for the civil List of government space agencies, space program ...

at the

Kennedy Space Center The John F. Kennedy Space Center (KSC, originally known as the NASA Launch Operations Center), located on Merritt Island, Florida, is one of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's (NASA) ten field centers. Since December 1968 ...

and

Cape Canaveral Air Force Station Cape Canaveral Space Force Station (CCSFS) is an installation of the United States Space Force's Space Launch Delta 45, located on Cape Canaveral in Brevard County, Florida. Headquartered at the nearby Patrick Space Force Base, the statio ...

. As the academic scope of the university broadened, it was renamed to the University of Central Florida in 1978.

Modern appearances

Since 2014, the Citronaut has experienced a renaissance in university publications, athletics programing, and merchandise. * May 10, 2014 – UCF Baseball proclaimed Citronaut Day * September 19, 2015 – UCF Men's Soccer played in fauxback Citronaut uniforms * Spring 2016 – Knights in Space * November 2018 – Citronaut appears on uniforms of the UCF football team against Temple in the themed Space Game. * November 2019 – Citronaut appears on uniforms of the UCF football team against Houston Cougars in the themed Space Game that took off at noon on Saturday, November 2, 2019. * April 2022 - Citronaut appears on UCF softball uniforms in a game against Virginia Tech.

References

{{University of Central Florida University of Central Florida Mascots introduced in 1968