Port Union: This communities "claim to fame" is that it is first and only union-built town in, not only Newfoundland, but also in Canada. Construction was begun in 1916 with the idea that the town would to be the Sir William Ford Coaker and the Fishermen's Protective Union's commercial headquarters.

Coaker, born in 1871 and by 1902 he had served as a telegraph operator, a customs worker, and a postmaster.

In 1903 Coaker formed a telegraph operators' union, though a year later he quit the union and his three most recent professions.

Later he retire to Coakerville, an island at Dildo Run where he took up farming, and began to contemplate an organization of fishermen and organized the first meeting of what would become the Fishermen's Protective Union in the Loyal Orange Lodge at Herring Neck, in November of 1908.

It is said that he led the organization as it expanded into a "multifaceted interest involved in trading, publishing, light and power, shipbuilding, shipping and cold storage". He was made a Knight Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1923.

Used with permission from "Uncovering the Origin of 1001 Unique Place Names in Newfoundland and Labrador" 2021 Jennifer Leigh Hill

Address of this page: http://nl.ruralroutes.com/PortUnionNL