company town

American  

noun

1. a town whose inhabitants are mainly dependent on one company for employment, housing, supplies, etc.

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company town British  

noun

1. a town built by a company for its employees

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Etymology

Origin of company town

An Americanism dating back to 1930–35

Example Sentences

Its stucco walls and Spanish arches were once part of a Pacific Coast Borax company town, later abandoned when the boom ended.

From Los Angeles Times

Industrialist Henry Ford was after rubber when he built the company town Fordlandia on a Connecticut-sized patch of Brazil’s Amazon forest in 1927.

From Barron's

Industrialist Henry Ford was after rubber when he built the company town Fordlandia on a Connecticut-sized patch of Brazil’s Amazon forest in 1927.

From Barron's

“No one has ever subdivided a company town before,” Bullwinkel said, noting that many other company towns that dotted the country in the 19th century “just disappeared, as far as I know.”

From Los Angeles Times

The first big hurdle was figuring out how to legally prepare the homes for sale: as a company town, Scotia was not made up of hundreds of individual parcels, with individual gas meters and water mains.

From Los Angeles Times