Big Axe – Longley

An oversized axe outside a pub in the Huon Valley is a more pointed local reference than it first appears.

Tasmania's timber industry is the subject, and it is not a settled one. The forests south and west of Hobart carried some of the tallest hardwood in the world, the industry that cut them shaped the economy of the Huon and Derwent valleys for well over a century, and the arguments over what should be logged and what should be protected have been among the most bitter in Australian environmental politics. An axe is the emblem of one side of that, and it is displayed without apology.