The 1925 renaming: how the Town of Tillman became the Town of Palm Bay
In 1924 the residents of unincorporated Tillman asked the Legislature for a charter as the Town of Palm Bay. It was granted in the 1925 session, and on December 16, 1925, the Post Office changed the town's post office name from Tillman to Palm Bay.
Palm Bay got its name and its first government in the same act. According to the National Register nomination for St. Joseph’s Catholic Church, which traces the town’s early history, Tillman had stayed unincorporated for almost forty years, and in 1924 its citizens decided to ask the state Legislature for a charter of incorporation under a new name, the “Town of Palm Bay.”
The charter and the post office
The Legislature granted the charter in its 1925 regular session. The new town took in all of old Tillman and more territory besides. Until an election could be held the next year, the citizens appointed a town commission and a mayor. On December 16, 1925, the nomination records, the U.S. Post Office announced that the local post office’s name had changed from Tillman to Palm Bay.
The City of Palm Bay’s own timeline puts it in one line: in 1925, “the 200 residents of Tillman decide their name doesn’t accurately depict the charming town and petition to change the name to Palm Bay.”
From town to city
The town grew slowly for thirty years. The 1960 census counted 2,808 people, and the city’s timeline records that in 1960, under Mayor Harry Pollak and the town council, Palm Bay was incorporated as a city. That story is on our 1960 page, and the town before the rename is on our Tillman page.
Further Reading
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