Short answers, pulled from the story.
The first launch from Cape Canaveral was a Bumper rocket on the 24th of July 1950, from what is now known as LC-3. The site had been established in 1949 when President Harry S. Truman founded the Joint Long Range Proving Ground at Cape Canaveral.
Cape Canaveral was selected because rockets launched eastward fly over the open Atlantic Ocean, reducing risk to populated areas. Its proximity to the equator also provides a rotational speed boost of about 908 miles per hour, aiding eastward launches.
Cape Canaveral was the launch site for the first U.S. satellite in 1958, the first U.S. astronaut in 1961, the first American in orbit in 1962, and the first spacecraft to fly past every planet in the solar system between 1962 and 1977. It also launched the first spacecraft to leave the solar system in 1977.
President Lyndon B. Johnson renamed the site Cape Kennedy in 1963 following the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. The change proved unpopular because Cape Canaveral is one of the oldest place-names in the United States, dating to the early 1500s. Florida's legislature passed a bill restoring the original name, which Governor Reubin Askew signed into law in 1974.
The installation was formally renamed Cape Canaveral Space Force Station on the 9th of December 2020, reflecting the establishment of the United States Space Force. It had previously been known as Cape Canaveral Air Force Station from 2000 to 2020.
Astronauts Gus Grissom, Ed White, and Roger Chaffee were killed in a cabin fire during a spacecraft test on pad 34 on the 27th of January 1967. The planned launch date had been the 21st of February 1967. Only the concrete launch pedestal at LC-34 remains today as a monument to the crew.