Australian
Screen

Teacher’s notes

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This black-and-white, silent clip shows a timber mill in the 1920s and the process of converting logs into timber planks. The clip opens with the intertitle 'At the mill, the rough logs are treated and cut into desired sizes’. It then shows the timber yard, where two workers use a two-person saw to cut a log into manageable sections, or flitches. A man uses a hook and chain (bull chain) to drag a flitch to the mill building. The clip cuts to the interior of the mill, where in the rear of the shot two workers can be seen using adzes to give the flitches a flat face. In foreground, four men manoeuvre a flitch onto a bench, where a circular saw cuts it into planks.

Educational value points

• The clip depicts aspects of sawmill operation in the 1920s. The function of a sawmill, then and now, is to convert logs into dimensioned timber. The logs are taken to the mill to be debarked and then, as shown in this clip, are broken down into manageable flitches that are then transferred by a trolley on rails to a 'rip’ bench, where they are broken down into planks using a circular saw. The order of events remains largely unchanged today, though the process is now highly mechanised.

• In this period, sawmills were usually small in size, roughly twice the length of the longest log to be sawed, and consisted of a power source (usually a steam engine), a single saw and workbenches. Like the sawmill shown in this clip, the building was usually wooden, with the sides left open. A pair of tracks ran the length of the sawing floor, guiding the trolley that carried the log to the circular saw. Mills were often located in the forest, as transport was costly and slow prior to the introduction of motor vehicles.

• A table-top circular saw is shown in use. In the 1920s the circular saw was usually powered by a steam engine. Flitches were fed into the saw blade by the sawyer and converted into planks, while a man stood at the opposite end of the bench to remove and stack the cut timber. The sawyer initially used the trolley to feed the flitch into the saw blade, but as the wood was progressively cut smaller, the sawyer would handfeed it. In this period, larger mills began replacing the circular saw with the more efficient but costly bandsaw.

• In this clip, a two-person crosscut saw, which cuts across the grain of the wood, is used to break the log down into flitches. This was slow and hard manual labour, particularly as eucalypts were denser and harder to saw, and often larger in diameter, than the overseas woods for which the lumber tools were designed. In larger mills, logs were usually broken down with a steam-powered twin-rig saw.

• In the 1920s, sawmillers worked either a 44 or 48-hour week, with few breaks and a day off on Sunday. The heavy manual labour was physically demanding, with sprains, cuts, fatigue and serious injury (particularly from saw blades) common among workers. Sawmills were full of wood dust, which can cause respiratory problems and has since been identified as a carcinogen. Workers often had to endure extreme temperatures in buildings that had no heating and poor ventilation, or were little more than sheds.

• Little attention was given to occupational health and safety in this period. Workers shown in the clip do not wear protective clothing (although some have leather aprons) and the circular saw has no protective shielding over the sharp blade. Today’s health and safety regulations require that workers in sawmills wear safety glasses, ear plugs, steel-toed boots and a hard hat. Saw blades are now covered with a hood to prevent sawdust and small pieces of wood flying back toward the sawyer.

• The sawmill yard is engulfed in smoke from the smoking woodpile seen in the rear of the clip. In this period, bark, wood waste and logs with a defect (for example, a hollow core, insect damage or rot) were burned in open fires in the sawmill yard. These fires blazed almost continuously and caused a pall of wood smoke to hang over the mill. Today this practice has been stopped due to its harmful effect on the environment and the health of mill workers. Wood waste is now put to a number of uses, such as bio-fuel or compost, and is also pulped to make paper.

• Australia’s timber industry was well-established in the 1920s and supplied a range of markets, both in Australia and overseas. The timber shown here may have been used in construction and manufacturing, including house framing, joinery, flooring and furniture.

• From the Bush to the Bungalow is an example of an early documentary. In this period, films were silent and black and white. The size and weight of the cameras meant they were generally placed on tripods, and films tended to use static takes, such as those in this clip, with few close-ups. The film uses careful editing and the power of the visual image, as well as intertitles, to tell the story.

This black and white, silent clip opens with the intertitle 'At the mill, the rough logs are treated and cut into desired sizes’. There is a wide shot of the timberyard where two workers use a two person saw to cut a log into sections. A man uses a hook and chain to drag the log sections to the mill.

The clip cuts to the interior of the mill. Two man plane down the trunks. In foreground, four men shift a flitch onto a bench, where a circular saw cuts it into planks.