Labradorite is a member of the feldspar family of silicate minerals, and is thus related to Amazonite, Moonstone and Sunstone. This mineral reflects a sheen of many colours from just below its surface, which makes it unusual and beautiful.
My Uncle Ted believed that this mineral had the potential to be used for power generation. Since it is abundant in Labrador, he reasoned, developing a way to use its magnetic properties to generate electricity would be a lucrative and clean business for Newfoundland and Labrador. Unfortunately, he didn't live to test his theory.
According to the University of Waterloo, the attractive mineral was named after Labrador, where it was found in the 1700s by Moravian missionaries. It is also found in Morocco and elsewhere.
NRCan attributes the name of Labrador (and thus labradorite) to a Portuguese explorer, Joao Fernandes, from the Azores. The theory is that the Portuguese word for landholder, lavrador, was first applied to the coast of Greenland, and later transferred by cartographers to the coast of North America. (Labrador also gave its name to a breed of retriever dog.)
Formerly, I suspected it was related to the French words bras (arm) and d'or (made of gold) -- a golden arm. This would fit with the idea of Champlain's vain search for a legendary city of gold in the St. Lawrence. The flaw in this theory of the word origin of Labrador is that the French noun bras is not feminine, but masculine, so the name should by this logic be Lebrasdor.
Caryl Haxworth believes that labradorite can be used to stimulate imagination and strengthen intuition, as well as having a calming effect.
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