Remaining wood sculptures in Truro coming down

TRURO, N.S. – It’s the end of an era.
For years they graced the streets of Truro, familiar landmarks that both fascinated tourists and served to remind us of our heritage.
But within days, the town’s few remaining wood sculptures will be no more.
“It was a great project,” said Andrew Williams, urban forestry coordinator for Truro. “It attracted a lot of press for the town, spurred a lot of spin-off projects across Canada and the U.S., but it’s run its course.”
In 1999, like most communities across North America, Truro was dealing with the devastating toll taken by Dutch elm disease on the stately trees.
To make the best of a bad situation, the town had a number of the trees carved into 43 statues, depicting significant moments or people associated with the town’s history.
Now, after years of being subjected to the ravages of time and Maritime weather, there are plans to tear down the remaining five statues in the coming weeks.
Monday, the lumberjack statue outside Arlington Place was taken down after its head fell off and smashed against the sidewalk late last week.
“Unfortunately, due to decay, it was closer to being soil on the inside than it was wood,” said Williams.
“Two ladies in the salon in that area said they were just talking and looking out the window, and it suddenly just rolled right off the shoulders, hit the sidewalk and splintered into a bunch of pieces.”
Inspections have been conducted on the last five statues which revealed they are in a similar state of decay and are beyond saving.
“The decay has progressed to the point of where they will all need to be taken down,” said Williams.
“I still just have a few property owners to contact, but as soon as we get everyone up to speed on what the plans are, we’ll just start knocking them down.”
The work is estimated to be carried out within the next few weeks.
“They were a stop-gap measure from the beginning,” Williams said.
“They were just a means of making lemonade with the lemons we were dealt out of the loss of the mature street-side elms. The statues were just something to fill the void in the interim with some artwork promoting the local history and heritage.”