TITUSVILLE

city, seat (1879) of Brevard county, east-central Florida, U.S. The city is linked to the John F. Kennedy Space Center on northern Merritt Island via a causeway across the Indian River (lagoon). It was originally founded (1867) as Sand Point by Colonel Henry T. Titus, for whom it was renamed in 1874. When incorporated as a town in 1886, it was a port served by a mule-drawn railway that carried freight as far as Sanford, 35 miles (56 km) inland. In 1887 the Jacksonville, Tampa, and Key West Railroad was extended to Titusville, which developed as a citrus-shipping point and commercial-fishing port. It attained city status in 1946 and consolidated with Indian River City and Whispering Hills Golf Estate in 1963. Its economy has become increasingly dominated by tourism and the nearby aerospace research and industrial complex. Pop. (1992 est.) city, 40,922; (1990) MelbourneTitusvillePalm Bay MSA, 398,978. city, Crawford county, northwestern Pennsylvania, U.S. It lies along Oil Creek, 40 miles (64 km) southeast of Erie. Founded in 1796 by Jonathan Titus and Samuel Kerr, surveyors for the Holland Land company, it developed as a lumbering and agricultural centre. On August 27, 1859, the world's first successful oil well was drilled just outside the city limits by Edwin L. Drake, marking the beginning of the state's oil boom. The nation's first oil refinery was installed there, and the first extensive natural-gas industry was developed in the area about 1872. On June 5, 1892, Oil Creek flooded, wrecking many oil tanks and causing extensive damage. Titusville's last refinery closed in 1950; lumber, steel products, aluminum castings, and plastic products are now the city's major manufactures. A regional campus (1963) of the University of Pittsburgh is in Titusville. A replica of the original well house and derrick are at the Drake Well Museum. Inc. borough, 1847; city, 1866. Pop. (1990) 6,434; (1998 est.) 6,367.