Sheep Shearer - History

History

During the early years of sheep breeding in Australia, shearing was carried out by shepherds, assigned servants, Ticket of Leave men, and free labourers using blade shears. As the sheep industry expanded, more shearers were required. Although the demand had increased, the conditions had not, and shearers had to contend with terrible working conditions, very long hours and low pay. In 1888, Australia became the first country in the world have a complete shearing, at Dunlop Station, finished using machines. By 1915, most large Australian sheep station shearing sheds had machines that were powered by steam engines. Later, internal combustion engines powered machines until rural power supplies became available.

Read more about this topic:  Sheep Shearer

Famous quotes containing the word history:

    We don’t know when our name came into being or how some distant ancestor acquired it. We don’t understand our name at all, we don’t know its history and yet we bear it with exalted fidelity, we merge with it, we like it, we are ridiculously proud of it as if we had thought it up ourselves in a moment of brilliant inspiration.
    Milan Kundera (b. 1929)

    The true theater of history is therefore the temperate zone.
    Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel (1770–1831)

    History does nothing; it does not possess immense riches, it does not fight battles. It is men, real, living, who do all this.... It is not “history” which uses men as a means of achieving—as if it were an individual person—its own ends. History is nothing but the activity of men in pursuit of their ends.
    Karl Marx (1818–1883)