Citation
Maydena, the Rise & Fall of a Logging Town, Peter MacFie, P & P, 4th Australian Forest History Society Conference, Gympie, Queensland, April 1999.
Also
Maydena : the Tasmanian Newsprint Town, or, The Colonising of a Valley. Peter MacFie, 2000 (16p).
Outline
This paper investigates the formative years of Australian Newsprint Mills (ANM), centred around the construction of the Boyer Mill on the Derwent River in 1940 and the logging town of Maydena constructed in 1948. Planning for the company’s logging operation in the Styx, Tyenna and Florentine Valleys in southern Tasmania, began in 1934, resulting in a large Concession being approved by Parliament for these areas. A controversial addition was the addition of over 3,000 acres under Mt Field West, pushed through parliament by the Ogilvie Government in 1950. The purpose-built logging town of Maydena became the bush HQ, where innovations in forest management were attempted. The new company introduced trained foresters and other managers who managed skilled local bushmen with a sawmilling background. The impact of the new culture on the old was effectively the colonising of a valley, and the sociology of the valley is also investigated.
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Excerpt
Historical Background – Newsprint from Eucalypts
In the board-rooms of Melbourne and the laboratories of scientific bodies, decisions were being made which would alter the character and employment patterns of the remote Tasmanian valley.
WWI left Australia destitute of newsprint. Among the many who felt the isolation was a young Australian journalist Keith Murdoch, who broke military censorship to expose the news of the debacle at Gallipoli. He was steered through the ranks of Melbourne’s Herald & Weekly Times by Theodore Fink, becoming managing director in 1928, before falling out with his mentor.[1] Today the Fink and Murdoch ‘camps’ are divided over the claim for the newsprint industry.[2] Both men had witnessed Australia’s vulnerability and determined to not let happen again.[3] Theodore’s son Thorold Fink was given responsibility for establishing the first phase of the industry.[4]
The idea of a newsprint industry from Australian timbers wasn’t new, but preliminary tests and European attitudes were disappointing. In 1923 LR Benjamin, a young chemist who had trained in Western Australia under I. H. Boas, arrived in Tasmania to discuss a survey of the island’s timber resources. They had both worked for the fore-runner of the CSIRO.[5] The Tasmanian Forestry Department conducted a survey of the Florentine Valley in 1922, while the Commonwealth provided sea-planes for aerial surveying, all with the intention of assessing timber resources for the manufacture of paper from native species.[6]
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Footnotes for this excerpt
[1]Garden, Don Theodore Fink, a Talent for Ubiquity, Melbourne University Press , 1998, p 227.
[2]see Monks, John Elisabeth Murdoch – Two Lives, Melbourne, 1995, p 125-6.
[3]Garden, op cit., p 228.
[4]ibid, p 228.
[5]The Institute of Science & Industry, see Rawson, Jacqueline A History of the Australian Paper Making Industry, 1818-1951, Univ. of Melbourne, 1954, p 60 ff
[6]MacFie, Peter Maydena The Newsprint Logging Town, unpubl draft.
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Index items
Acts of Parliament
alcohol issues
angling
ANM
APPM
architectural styles
Australian-American Association
Australian Newsprint Mills
axes
badminton
Barratt, Betty
Beattie, Dennis
Benjamin, Lou
Benjamin, Louis R.S.
big trees
Boas, Isaac H.
Boyer Mill
bridges
British
Burnie paper mill
Burnie paper Mill
Burns, Reg
bushfires
bushmen
Calder, James
camps
Canada
Canberra School of Forestry
car rallying
Cashion, Mick
Cashman, Gus
Cataract Creek
chainsaws
Churchill, Elias
Climax loco
Coleman, Gaye
Controller of Timber
convicts
crawler tractors
Creak, Kim
cricket
cross-cut saw
crotch rigs
Crown Zellerbach
Cunningham, Allan
CWA
Czech
Dargavel, John
deaths
Depot
Depression
Derwent River
Derwent Valley
Derwent Valley Paper Co
Derwent Valley Railway
Derwent Valley.
Digit Dick
Diogenes Creek
dolly pegs
Donaldson, Sam
Eucalyptus regnans
Fairfax
Fairfax, Warwick
fallers
Fink, Theodore
Fink, Thorold
Fitzgerald
Fletcher-Challenge
Florentine River
Florentine Valley
football
foreign workers.
Foremen Street
Forestry Commission
forestry research
Frankcombe, Don
Freydig, Paul
Gallipoli
Gibson, Neil
Gilbert, Max
Gordon, Byron
Gourlays Sawmill
Hecht, Hans
heel boom loaders
Helm, A. D.
Henry, Rod
Herald & Weekly Times
Hickey, John
high lead riggers
high lead trees
housing
Humphries, Curly
Huon Co Sawmill
hydro electricity
Institute of Foresters of Australia
Italians
Junee
Karanja
Kessell, Kim
Kessell, Stephen Lackey (Kim)
Kitchener, Dan
landscaping
language
Lithuanians
Locher, Jan
Locher, Patrina (Mrs Jan)
Manpower Act
Marriott family
Marriott, Robert
Marshalling Yards.
Maydena
Maydena Axemen’s Carnival
Maydena Players
Maydena Project
Maydena.
McCallum family
McCallum, John
McKay, Alexander
mineral exploration
minor species
Mollison, Bill
money
Mt Field National Park
Mt Field West
Murdoch, Dame Elisabeth
Murdoch, Elisabeth (Mrs Keith)
Murdoch, Keith
Mussen group
national identity
national self sufficiency
New Norfolk
New Zealanders
newsprint
Nicholson’s Spur
Ocean Falls, British Colombia
Ogilvie, Albert
Ogilvy, Graeme
Pavlovic, Johnny
Payne Pty Ltd
Payne, Jack
Payne, Reg
Payne, Stan
pegs
Pioneer Woodware Co
Polish
powers of ANM
practical jokes
pre-fab homes
public amenities
railways
Rainbird, Allan
Rees, Leslie
regeneration
religion
Research Station
Risby’s Camp
Risby’s Basin
Risbys Sawmill
Roosevelt, Franklin D.
RSL Club
RSL Women’s Auxiliary
safety
Salter, Rex
Sam The Rigger
Sargison, Graeme
sassafras
sawmills
seed trees
Serbian
Singlemen’s Quarters
Skagit loader,
Skyline systems
Smith, Noel
Snob Hill
Social life
South-west Concession
staff welfare
Statton, Percy
Styx River
Styx Valley
surveys
Swamp Gums
Tasmanian Forestry Department
Tasmanian Tiger
The Gap
The Needles,
Thylacine
tram-ways
trucking contractors
trucks
Twelvetrees, William Harper
Tyenna
Tyenna Valley
unions
Watson, George
White, Mike
Wickam, Bob
Wickam, Mavis (Mrs Bob)
World War II
WWI veterans
WWII
Youd, Doug
Copyright Peter MacFie©1999,2018