La Palma once had a name that left very little doubt about the neighborhood business: Dairyland. When the city incorporated in 1955, 18 dairies occupied an area of just 1.76 square miles, according to the city’s history page.
The name lasted a decade. In 1965, the community became La Palma, a choice the city links to Orange County’s Spanish heritage and its main street, La Palma Avenue. As the dairies relocated, the small farming community planned for a different kind of future.
The Civic Center and Central Park were among the early projects in that development program. In the early 1980s, the Centerpointe redevelopment project added commercial and light-industrial uses. Those familiar places help explain how a compact dairy community became the city residents know today.
A lovely bit of evidence sits in the Orange County Archives: a 1955 photograph shows the community’s incorporation papers being filed with County Clerk B.J. Smith. Looking at it alongside the city’s account makes the name change feel less abstract. Before the parks and office buildings, someone had to make Dairyland official, paperwork and all.
