Herring Neck

Herring Neck
Town
Country	Canada
Province	Newfoundland and Labrador
Settled	1760's
Time zone	UTC-3:30 (Newfoundland Time)
• Summer (DST)	UTC-2:30 (Newfoundland Daylight)
Area code	709

Herring Neck is a fishing community located at the northeastern extremity of New World Island, Notre Dame Bay of Newfoundland and Labrador, Canada. The community encompasses several small contiguous communities such as Cobb's Arm, Too Good Arm, Ship Island, Merritt's Harbour, Salt Harbour and Sunnyside. The name has changed many times in its history; at one time the area now called Herring Neck was called Goshen’s Arm and the areas now called Pike’s Arm and Green Cove was called Herring Neck.

The origin of the name comes from the early fishermen's practice of portaging loads of herring across the narrow neck of Pike's Arm. This was necessary to avoid the journey around the Arm and the treacherous headwaters.

It is believed the first European settler of the area was Jimmy Chant in the 1760s. It first appeared in the Census of 1845 with a population of 546, which included the surrounding settlements as noted above. By 1857 the population had reached 610 and peaked out near 1000 in the 1880s. It remained around that figure until the 1930s, from where it has steadily declined to 607 in the 1981 census. The population has continued to decline due to the cod moratorium and the downsizing of the fish processing plant in the community. Many have left the community to seek employment in larger communities.

File:Orange Lodge.jpg

The former Loyal Orange Lodge located in Sunnyside, Herring Neck, NL

In November 1908 at the Orange Hall, William Coaker gathered together a group of fisherman to form what became later the Fisherman's Protective Union.