Logging commenced in the Delatite River basin at Mirimbah, below Mount Buller, in 1935. In the mid-to-late 1940s, many sawmills transferred from central Victoria to the Alpine Ash forests of northeastern Victoria and Gippsland. Sawmills were built in Mansfield in 1947 and 1948 with timber drawn from forests in the King, Howqua and Jamieson River basins. The Forests Commission built the Jamieson-Licola Road in the mid-1950s to access the Alpine Ash forests (Licola to Lazarini by 1955/56) In 1977 there were five sawmills in Mansfield, and one each in Jamieson, Benalla, Wangaratta and Eurobin drawing timber from the mountain forests of the Mansfield District.