Inducted: 1999
Lakeland Senior High Graduate,
Jerry Yachabach was named Inc. Magazine’s 1989 Entrepreneur of the Year. In 1983, he founded Protel, Inc., a Lakeland-based company providing pay telephone equipment, parts and software to telecommunications companies worldwide. In his early career, he worked in aerospace technology for projects that included the Apollo space missions and in munitions development for the military. He and his brother also formed Teltronics, Inc. a Fortune 500 company that developed and manufactured pay phone products.