By Ron Hayes
COUNTY POCKET — Mark Alba was never a mayor, but to his many friends and acquaintances in South County, he was "The Mayor."
"You couldn't go anywhere in Delray Beach without someone knowing him," remembers his roommate, John Kiggins. "He was just very popular, very social, and a real mainstay in the nightspots along Atlantic Avenue, even though he wasn't a drinker, so he became known as the mayor."
Mark "The Mayor" Alba died suddenly of heart failure on June 26. He was 53, and had lived in the area since 1989.
Before moving to Lake Worth shortly before his death, Mr. Alba shared a house with Kiggins on Surf Road in the county pocket south of Briny Breezes.
"About a year ago, he built an amazing Tiki bar in the backyard that sort of became the centerpiece in our neighborhood," remembers John Ferber, another longtime friend.
Only after the bar was complete, did the renters remember that they hadn't asked their landlord's permission to erect the structure.
"Then the landlord saw it and loved it," Ferber says. "He said, 'I always wanted to do this.'"
When not impulsively building, Mr. Alba was a book lover who spent hours on the beach, pursuing an amateur historian's love of World War II military history. He retained a love for his native New England, followed the Red Sox and New England Patriots faithfully, and also dabbled in the local antique market.
"He had a knack for buying something at the Goodwill store for $10 and selling it in an auction for $200," says Kiggins.
Mark Benjamin Alba was born on Dec. 17, 1955, in Winchester, Mass. A 1977 graduate of Boston College, he had worked for Merrill Lynch of New York before coming to Florida, where he continued to work as a financial trader.
Mr. Alba is survived by two sisters, Beverly Alba and Cynthia Alba, and a brother, Bruce, all of Massachusetts.
A memorial service was held in Winthrop, Mass., with a local memorial on the beach to be announced.
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