page_title: Melbourne, Florida
section_title: Settlement
hierarchical_section_title: Melbourne, Florida / History / Settlement
caption_attribution_description: English: The second Hotel Carleton, Melbourne, Florida. It was built almost immediately after the first Hotel Carleton burned in 1904, but would itself burn in 1925.
context_page_description: Melbourne is a city in Brevard County, Florida, United States. It is seventy-two miles southeast from Orlando. As of the 2010 census, there was a population of 76,068. The municipality is the second-largest in the county by both size and population. Melbourne is a principal city of the Palm Bay – Melbourne – Titusville, Florida Metropolitan Statistical Area. In 1969 the city was expanded by merging with nearby Eau Gallie.
context_section_description: After the Civil War, pioneer families arrived, and Melbourne was founded in 1867.
  The first settlers arrived after 1877. They included Richard W. Goode, his father John Goode, Cornthwaite John Hector, Captain Peter Wright, Balaam Allen, Wright Brothers, and Thomas Mason. Three of these men, Wright, Allen, and Brothers were black freedmen.
  The city, formerly called "Crane Creek", was named Melbourne in honor of its first postmaster, Cornthwaite John Hector, an Englishman who had spent much of his life in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. He is buried in the Melbourne Cemetery, along with many early residents in the area. The first school in Melbourne was built in 1883 and is on permanent exhibit on the campus of Florida Institute of Technology. By 1885, the town had 70 people. The Greater Allen Chapel African Methodist Episcopal Church was founded in 1885 and is still active.
  In the late 1890s, the Brownlie-Maxwell Funeral Home opened and it is still in business. The oldest black-owned business in the county is Tucker's Cut-Rate plumbing. It opened in 1934.
  In the early 1900s, houses were often built in the frame vernacular style.
  In 1919, a fire destroyed most of the original downtown along Front Street. At the time, it was rebuilt west of US Hwy 1.
  During the Jim Crow years, black people were required to enter movie theaters via a different entrance from whites and sit in the balcony. Gas stations had signs for rest rooms labeled "Men", "Women", and "Colored." This persisted until integration in the late 1960s.
  In late 1942 the Naval Air Station Melbourne was established as a site to train newly commissioned Navy and Marine pilots for World War II. The program ran until 1946, and the land that was used for that program makes up most of what is currently the Orlando Melbourne International Airport.
  In 1969, the cities of Eau Gallie and Melbourne voted to merge, forming modern-day Melbourne.
caption: The Hotel Carleton c. 1907
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