Mr. Lonnie Thomas Bergeron

Born in Madisonville, Louisiana in 1942, Mr. Bergeron moved to Davie, Florida at the age of three, where his father Percy T. Bergeron opened one of the town’s first grocery stores.

As a youngster, Mr. Bergeron fell in love with the Everglades, which was on his doorstep in 1940s-era Davie. His grandfather, Lonnie Harvey, was a state game warden over the Everglades.

Another childhood passion that stuck with him his whole life was the rodeo. Then as today, rodeo was held at Davie’s arena that his father and other town pioneers originally built.

Cowboys, especially those rugged rodeo riders that he saw compete, became his heroes.

Mr. Bergeron eventually followed his dream and became a professional rodeo cowboy. He traveled the professional circuit, riding bulls and bareback horses, wrestling steers and team roping.

For awhile he lived the life of a cowboy in Wyoming, returning to Davie in the 1980’s to work with his brother Ronald Bergeron Sr. in the road construction business.

As vice president of Bergeron Land Development, Mr. Bergeron helped build or improve many major Florida highways and roads in the 1980s and 1990s.

He moved to Orlando in the early 1990s to open the Central Florida division of Bergeron Land Development. In the early 2000s, Mr. Bergeron retired and moved to Ormond Beach. Mr. Bergeron moved his family to Live Oak in North Florida where he was living at time of his death.

Lonnie T. Bergeron is survived by his wife Sandy, sons Michael of Daytona Beach and Travis Whitaker of New Smyrna Beach, daughter Tammy of Live Oak, his grandson Matthew, and his two brothers, Ronald and Donnie.

Funeral services will be held Tuesday, April 21 at the Bergeron Rodeo Grounds at 10am. Burial to follow at Forest Lawn Cemetery at noon. Refreshments will be served in the Forest Lawn Hall following the burial.