Who is Owney Wishnell from Stern Men and what is their importance?

The son of the famed lobsterer, Ned Wishnell, whose drowning death while rescuing a hotheaded young fool leads to the end of the lobster war of the mid-1950s, Owney then abandoned by his mother, Allison Cavanaugh, and is raised by his uncle, Pastor Toby Wishnell. From childhood, Owney longs to be a lobsterman, but Toby forbids this and pushes him to the ministry. Owney grows into a large, painfully quiet young man with strong Swedish features.