RAINBOW CITY
The name of Silver City, including Camp Coiner, will be changed to Rainbow City.
By an overwhelming majority, residents of the area chose the most colorful of six names offered for voting and Governor Newcomer has issued a circular officially designating the area Rainbow City. The change in names was made effective May 1.
The public poll on the selection of a name was the first ever held in the Canal Zone and met with great appeal to the residents. As expressed in the official report of the Tally Committee to the Governor: "The voting fever was high and the entire townsite on the evening of the 17th had the pleasant air of a country election."
The official count, as reported by Judge E.I.P. Tatelman, Chairman of the Tally Committee, was: Rainbow City, 771; Silver City, 256; Granada, 74; Manzanillo, 72; Folks City, 55; and Mindi, 7. Sixteen ballots were incorrectly marked or otherwise made invalid.
Few popular elections ever reach the proportions of returns as did the Silver City-Rainbow City-Camp Coiner voting. Of the total of approximately 1,280 ballots distributed to those with quarters' assignments there, all but 30 were returned. Nearly one-third of the ballots were marked and returned the same afternoon they were distributed by the five International Boy Scout Troops.
Silver City: which was built during the early 1920's, was never officially named, while Camp Coiner was so named while occupied by the Army Engineers during the past war.
Election Very Popular:The Governor authorized the popular vote on the name of the town after residents nicknamed that part of Silver City being built as "Rainbow City" because of the various colors of the houses. The other four names shown on the ballots were selected for the following reasons: Mindi and Folks City, for the two small rivers in that area; Manzanillo, for the island on which Cristobal-Colon is built; and Granada, which was the former name of Colombia.
