R3208 'Geeveston Saw Mills and wagon load', 1890s
Description
This is a sepia albumen photograph taken by J W Beattie in the 1890s, measuring 17.4 cm x 22.3 cm, and titled 'Geeveston Saw Mills and wagon load'. It depicts a timber worker standing at the front of a railway wagon loaded with a massive sawn tree trunk in the yard of Geeveston Saw Mills, Tasmania. The log is both chained to and wedged on the wagon, which runs on eight squat wheels and is pulled by horses, one of which can be made out, blurred by movement, on the left. In the background, behind the sawmill buildings, is a hillside which has been logged, leaving only small trees behind.
Acknowledgements: Reproduced courtesy of National Library of Australia. Photograph by John Watt Beattie.
- Educational value
- This asset provides an example of the giant trees that were logged and cut into sawn timber from Tasmanian forests in the 1890s - Huon pine was particularly sought after for shipbuilding because its timber was extremely durable, water-resistant and lightweight.
- It shows one of the numerous mills set up around Geeveston, usually as part of a family operation - in the 1920s, Geeveston boasted the largest timber mill in the southern hemisphere; the mills were moved regularly to be close to the logging area.
- It shows the wooden tram tracks that were built to bring timber to the mill or to the railheads for shipment to the towns and ports of Tasmania - crude tram tracks were made with squared wooden runners fixed with steel nails to sleepers; this was much cheaper than using steel tracks.
- It illustrates the wagons, or jinkers, used for transporting heavy loads of timber - jinkers were constructed in two-wheeled sections and could be adjusted to accommodate any length of log; the wheels were small and wide to cope with the huge weight of the timber; steel flanges, or risers, guided the wheel on the track and each of the four wheels had a substantial brake pad attached to a timber cross-bar; since Australia had limited manufacturing capacity in the 1900s, especially for steel, almost all rolling stock, including jinkers, was imported from England.
- It provides a glimpse of a horse on the left of the photograph - horses, along with bullocks and steam engines, were used to haul the wagons along the tramways; mills were usually set up at the bottom of a valley so that loaded wagons were easier to move down to them, with the horses and engines used to pull the empty wagons back up the hillside.
- It shows the methods of supporting and securing the logs on the wagon - chocks were wedged under the lower sections of the log to prevent rolling while a chain secured the log to the rod that connected the two parts of the jinker.
- It depicts one of the timber workers posing in front of the cross-cut to emphasise its size - loggers targeted trees that would provide a great deal of timber, often damaging other trees and the forest infrastructure in the process; sparse tree growth, such as that in the background of the picture, was often the result of these activities.
- It illustrates the photography of J W Beattie (1859-1930) - Beattie had to carry his bulky equipment, including a mobile darkroom, into the field for his landscape and exploration photography, but by 1880, glass plate photography with light-sensitive coatings had been introduced, eliminating the necessity for a darkroom onsite; the Geeveston Saw Mills photograph was published in Beattie's 'Albums of photographs of Tasmania (1820-1860)'.
- Year level
- 4; 5; 6; 7; 8; 9; 10; 11; 12
- Topics
- Australian history
- Timber
- Pine trees
- Trams
- Natural heritage
- Logging
- Learning area
- History
- Studies of society and environment
- Strand
- History/Historical knowledge and understandings
- Studies of society and environment/Time, continuity and change
- Rights
- © Education Services Australia Ltd and National Library of Australia, 2010, except where indicated under Acknowledgements
