Brevard County Florida Since 1848
The mainland citrus belt, the Indian River Lagoon, the barrier-island beaches, and the space program built the place we now call the Space Coast.
We cover the regional history that ties the eight cities together. Ais settlements before 1500, the Florida East Coast Railroad cutting south in 1885, the 1894 freezes that wiped the citrus belt clean, Project Bumper firing from Cape Canaveral in 1950, the Apollo boom-and-bust, the Indian River Lagoon's slow ecological collapse.
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Eight cities. One county.
About
What Old Space Coast Means, The Editorial Premise
Brevard County had a history before the rockets. The lagoon was here. The Ais were here. The citrus growers were here. This publication is about all of that, on its own terms.
Surfing
Surfing History of the Space Coast
Cocoa Beach became the East Coast surf capital in the 1960s. Kelly Slater grew up surfing the Cocoa Beach Pier. The East Coast Surfing Championships have run since 1964.
Economic history
The 1973 Oil Crisis and Brevard's Space-Program Layoffs
Apollo wound down through 1972. The 1973 oil embargo hit a Brevard economy already reeling from the post-Apollo aerospace contraction. Unemployment exceeded 15 percent in 1974.
Recreation
Recreational Fishing on the Space Coast, 1900 to Now
Mosquito Lagoon redfish, the snook regulations of the 1980s, the charter-boat tradition out of Port Canaveral. Brevard's recreational fishing identity predates the space program and outlasted citrus.
County history
Why Titusville is the County Seat (and not Cocoa or Melbourne)
Brevard's county seat moved from LaGrange (1855-1879) to Titusville (1879-present). The Cocoa-Rockledge area has tried to relocate it multiple times. Titusville's railroad connection in 1885 cemented its administrative role.
City history
The Eau Gallie / Melbourne Merger of 1969
Eau Gallie and Melbourne were separate cities for almost a century before merging in 1969. The merger created the city of Melbourne in its modern form.
The eight cities
Each city has its own publication.
Seven city sites cover what happened inside their boundaries. This hub covers everything that crosses them.
Old Cape Canaveral
Lighthouse, salt-marsh, the original cape and its keepers before NASA.
Old Cocoa
Indian River steamboats, citrus packing, the railroad depot at Magnolia.
Old Cocoa Beach
Surf-break origin story, the Mercury Seven, motels of the early space age.
Old Melbourne
Crane Creek, the Eau Gallie merger, Florida Tech, and the southern terminus.
Old Palm Bay
Turkey Creek, the postwar GDC platting boom, the largest city by area in Brevard.
Old Rockledge
Brevard's oldest incorporated city, river-bluff hotels of the Gilded Age.
Old Titusville
The county seat, the Apollo gateway, the closest mainland to Pad 39A.
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