Fyzabad is a town in southwestern Trinidad

Trinidad and Tobago

Trinidad and Tobago officially the Republic of Trinidad and Tobago is an archipelagic state in the southern Caribbean, lying just off the coast of northeastern Venezuela and south of Grenada in the Lesser Antilles...

, 13 km (8.1 mi) south of San Fernando

San Fernando, Trinidad and Tobago

The City of San Fernando with a population of 55,419 according to the 2000 census, is the larger of Trinidad and Tobago's two cities and the second largest municipality after Chaguanas. It occupies 18 km² and is located in the southwestern part of the island of Trinidad...

, west of Siparia

Siparia

Siparia is a town in southern Trinidad, in Trinidad and Tobago, south of Penal and south-east of Fyzabad. Also called "The Sand City," it was originally a non-Mission Amerindian settlement. Siparia grew to be the administrative centre for County Saint Patrick, and later the Siparia Regional...

 and northeast of Point Fortin

Point Fortin

Point Fortin, the smallest Borough in Trinidad and Tobago, is located in southwestern Trinidad, about southwest of San Fernando. After the discovery of petroleum in the area in 1906 the town grew into a major oil-producing centre. The town grew with the oil industry between the 1940s and 1980s,...

. It is named after the town of Faizabad

Faizabad

City of Faizabad , previous capital of Awadh, is the headquarters of Faizabad District and a municipal board in the state of Uttar Pradesh, India, situated on the banks of river Ghaghra . Faizabad has a twin city of Ayodhya, which is considered to be the birthplace of Rama...

 in India

India

India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

. Colloquially it is known as "Fyzo" by many people, especially taxicab drivers.

History

Fyzabad was founded by Rev. Kenneth J. Grant

Kenneth J. Grant

Rev. Kenneth J. Grant was a Canadian Presbyterian missionary who was one of the founding fathers of the Presbyterian Church of Trinidad and Tobago. He also founded Naparima College in 1894, the first secondary school on the island...

, a Presbyterian missionary in Trinidad in 1871. The purpose of the settlement was to separate Christian

Christian

A Christian is a person who adheres to Christianity, an Abrahamic, monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth as recorded in the Canonical gospels and the letters of the New Testament...

 Indians

Indo-Trinidadian

Indo-Trinidadian and Tobagonian are nationals of Trinidad and Tobago of Indian or other South Asian ancestry.Indo-Trinidadian and Tobagonians has now become interchangeable with Indians or East Indians. These were people who were taken from India by the British either as workers or educated...

 from the unconverted Hindu

Hinduism

Hinduism is the predominant and indigenous religious tradition of the Indian Subcontinent. Hinduism is known to its followers as , amongst many other expressions...

 and Muslim

Muslim

A Muslim, also spelled Moslem, is an adherent of Islam, a monotheistic, Abrahamic religion based on the Quran, which Muslims consider the verbatim word of God as revealed to prophet Muhammad. "Muslim" is the Arabic term for "submitter" .Muslims believe that God is one and incomparable...

 populations. The town later grew with the discovery of oil

Petroleum

Petroleum or crude oil is a naturally occurring, flammable liquid consisting of a complex mixture of hydrocarbons of various molecular weights and other liquid organic compounds, that are found in geologic formations beneath the Earth's surface. Petroleum is recovered mostly through oil drilling...

 in the area in 1917, and attracted a large number of immigrants from Grenada

Grenada

Grenada is an island country and Commonwealth Realm consisting of the island of Grenada and six smaller islands at the southern end of the Grenadines in the southeastern Caribbean Sea...

 and other Lesser Antillean

Lesser Antilles

The Lesser Antilles are a long, partly volcanic island arc in the Western Hemisphere. Most of its islands form the eastern boundary of the Caribbean Sea with the Atlantic Ocean, with the remainder located in the southern Caribbean just north of South America...

 islands. In 1937 Fyzabad was the centre of labour unrest, led by T.U.B. Butler

Tubal Uriah Butler

Tubal Uriah "Buzz" Butler , was a Grenadian-born Spiritual Baptist preacher and labour leader in Trinidad and Tobago...

 which is considered the birth of the Labour movement

Labour movement

The term labour movement or labor movement is a broad term for the development of a collective organization of working people, to campaign in their own interest for better treatment from their employers and governments, in particular through the implementation of specific laws governing labour...

 in Trinidad and Tobago.

The collapse of oil prices in the 1980s, coupled with declining onshore oil production, led to a decline in the town of Fyzabad. Billy Ocean

Billy Ocean

Billy Ocean is a Trinidad-born English Grammy Award winning popular music performer who had a string of rhythm and blues international pop hits in the 1970s and 1980s. He was the most popular British-based R&B singer / songwriter of the early to mid-1980s...

and locally famous lawyer Desmond Allum hail from Fyzabad.