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Lumbering
Limbering was the single most important industry on Random Island
until fairly recently. Large stands of virgin timber, with some trees
measuring 17 to 18 inches across the stump, first attracted men from the
wood-starved outer harbours of Trinity Bay.
The first mills were powered by wooden water wheels. The remains of
these old mills can still be found in the woods around Random Island. At
least one old wooden water-powered mills was still in operation in the
very early 1950s.
Stephen Blundell of Bay de Verde started the first year-round logging
and sawmilling operation at Hickman’s Harbour in 1850. He was quickly
copied by others who saw the need to supply fishing communities with
badly needed wood products, for barrels, casks, boats, masts, wharves,
flakes and stages, as well as for houses and heating. Numerous sawmills
sprung up on the island and surrounding mainland. The most intensive
early activity was around Hickman’s Harbour and on the mainland side of
Northwest Arm around Hatchet Cove and St. Jones Within. Shoal Harbour,
at the bottom tip of Northwest Arm was also a very important lumberin
center.
Logs were cut in the winter and floated down streams or hauled by
horses to the mills which cut them into lumber during the summer months.
Logging was not possible during the summer since without snow cover
there was no way to skid the logs to the mill site. Finished products
were either floated down and towed to markets or loaded into schooner
holds.
The 1874 censes shows nearly two million feet of lumber was cut in
the Northwest Arm area alone, worth 2,545 pounds. This included the
mainland centers as well but the total population of the area was only
417 at the time, so it was a considerable outport for such a small
number of people.
Lumbering was less active on the north side of the island, partly
because it had a somewhat lower population, but also because the
residents were more involved with fishing, slate quarrying and farming.
But five sawmills bordering Smith Sounds cut 670,000 feet of lumber in
1874.
By 1900, Hickman’s Harbour alone had six sawmills and most other
communities on the island had one or two. The mills at Hickman’s Harbor
employed 30 people, but extra men were probably employed seasonally in
the winter, cutting logs.
In the 1920s and ‘30s, much of the wood from the Shoal Harbour area
was going into production of boxes and barrels that were sold in St.
John’s for packing fish, oil, clothing and even Purity Biscuits. We were
not able to find reliable documentation showing the same was happening
on Random Island. But it is probable that at least part of the lumber
production from Random was going into boxes and barrels at the same
time. This had some important consequence during the depression.
According to an oral history account of Random Island completed as a
fourth-year history paper at Memorial University of Newfoundland by Rex
Clarke, on Random the worst effects of the Depression were alleviated
because there was always a market for wood products in St. John’s. Boxes
and barrels were in particular demand.
The industry began to decline after cardboard became a cheaper and
lightweight substitute. Hickman’s Harbour remained a sawmill center
however, into the 1950s. In 1952, twelve sawmills at Hickman’s Harbour
were employing 30 men and producing about 250,000 board feet of lumber
per year.
Decks Awash
Vol. 12, No. 2
March-April 1983
Page 8
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