Local shearing sheds are again echoing to the scuttling sound of hooves on boards, whirr of the electric gear and clank of presses – a far cry from the days of the sheds echoing to the click of the blades (hand shears) as the shearer took the full length of the blade for the cut and the ‘knockers’ met.
The record for a day’s blade shearing is 321 merinos in seven hours 40 minutes by Jackie Howe at ‘Alice Downs’, Blackall in Queensland in 1892.
However, in 1907 Deepwater local gun shearer John Edward Dean shore 274 sheep in a day at ‘Terrick’ on the Barcoo River & next day 284 sheep, at ‘Alice Downs’.
By this time fleeces weighed twice as much as when Howe was shearing!
Now we have local shearing champion Daniel McIntyre.
Wool in the early days often was either first washed on the sheep or scoured locally after shearing.
Blade shearing had been replaced by machines by 1910, but the men at Graham Robertson Cuninghame’s shed in 1915 were still using blades – shown here sharpening their gear on grindstones. Note the trouser legs tied with what were called bowyangs.
Peter & Jenny Sloman and Dudley Holder have set up a new exhibition of the Wool Industry and Shearing in our Land of the Beardies Museum, Glen Innes.
Shearing contractor Ray Stibbard wrote ‘Not a Dream’ – his memoir of the shearing industry in north-western New South Wales and southern Queensland and his son Lance’s shearing gear is featured.
Why not gather some friends and visit the museum to reminisce round the display?
Re-live your shearing, crutching, wool rolling, classing, rouseabouting, pressing, wool carting, shedding in wet weather, etc., days.
Some items you will see are two portable shearing stands – (one the ‘husband and wife shearing outfit’), handpieces, types of wool, early drenching gear, manual WE Sexton Little Champion wooden wool press and more.
Read the story of how Barry and Helen Finch won not once – but twice – the Ermenegildo Zegna Vellus Aureum (Latin for Golden Fleece) Award for the finest and most remarkable wool.
This trophy was established in 2002 to reward Australian sheep breeders for their efforts to obtain increasingly finer wools.
Members of the Spinners & Yarners group can be seen at work at the Museum on Monday mornings.
The museum is open 10am to 2pm daily.
