Tasmania in 1982 was a state divided: There was escalating protest action against a Hydro Electric Commission (HEC) plan to build a dam on the Gordon River, flooding 35 kilometres of the Franklin River in the state's south-west.
Labor was split on the issue, paving the way for Robin Gray's pro-dam Liberal government to win the May election and "get on with the job" of building the dam.
Scott Jordan was a student at Zeehan Primary School on the state's west coast during that charged time.
"We knew that the greenies were the enemy," Mr Jordan said.
"We didn't really understand who they were or what they believed in, but we knew it was them and us."
The HEC and the government said the dam project would bring thousands of jobs.
A referendum in 1981 showed how divided Tasmania was over the proposal.
The Gordon-below-Franklin dam received 47 per cent of the vote, 10 per cent voted for the then Labor premier Doug Lowe's compromise of a Gordon-above-Olga dam, and 33 per cent voted informally, writing "No dams" on their ballot papers.
"At the time, we knew there was a conflict in that town and in that region, and it was conservationists versus the workers," Mr Jordan said.
"With a bit bit of wisdom and a few years under my belt now, I see that those issues aren't so clear cut."
As an adult, Mr Jordan joined the Greens party and is involved in environmental activism.
After signing up to the party, he broke the news to his father, expecting a difference of opinion.
"He pulled a book off the shelf and it's the Wild Rivers book by [photographer] Peter Dombrovskis and [conservationist] Bob Brown, and it turned out he'd not only been an opponent of the dam but he'd been a supporter of Bob Brown and the Greens in the [party's] early political career," he said.
Dombrovskis's image of Rock Island Bend on the Franklin River was used as part of the campaign against the dam.
"I went through my entire childhood not knowing that my father had been an opponent of the dam," Mr Jordan said.
Protesters against the dam were based at Strahan, south of Zeehan, where they faced threats and violence from some of the locals who supported the HEC.
"One of the unfortunate things about the Franklin debate is the manner in which it split the community, and split families, and split political parties," University of Tasmania political scientist Kate Crowley said.
A political career begins
A blockade of the dam site started in December 1982 and continued for about two months. Police arrested 1,500 protesters during that time and 500 were jailed.
One of those jailed was Bob Brown, a director at the Tasmanian Wilderness Society and member of the United Tasmania Group — the precursor to the Tasmanian Greens and the world's first green party.
Mr Brown unsuccessfully contested a seat at the 1982 election, but his chance to enter parliament came when fellow dam opponent, Australian Democrat Norm Sanders, resigned later that year.
"It was pretty clear I'd win the seat if I put my hand up, having just failed at the last election, but the Wilderness Society wanted me to stay with them during this critical period of the campaign," Mr Brown said.
He was also visited by United Tasmania Group founder Richard Jones.
"Richard Jones came into prison and said, 'No, you've got to take this seat, Bob — It's our big chance' … so I did, and it was a good decision."
His time in politics — first in the state parliament and then in the Senate — lasted until 2012, but his time as an environmental activist continues.
The world's first green party
While it was the Franklin campaign that put a green politician into parliament for the first time, the movement had its roots in a campaign to stop the HEC's flooding of Lake Pedder.
The United Tasmania Group was formed on March 23, 1972, at a meeting at the Hobart Town Hall.
"I'm really very excited to be here at the Hobart Town Hall where it all began," former Tasmanian and Australian Greens leader Christine Milne said on Saturday night at a celebration of 50 years of green politics.
"It was taking environmentalism into the heart of politics, and nobody could have dreamed that, 50 years on, we have Green parties in over 90 countries in the world and Greens in government in six European countries and in New Zealand.
"The green politics that was developed here in Tasmania to save Lake Pedder has had a world-changing impact."
Lake Pedder was flooded in 1972, but the campaign against the Franklin dam was successful.
Despite Robin Gray's determination to build the dam, the project was stopped in 1983, when Bob Hawke's Labor government came to power in Canberra. Federal Labor had campaigned against the dam, which, by that time, had become a national issue.
"It catapulted Labor from opposition into federal government, which was a pretty big thing, and it also turned the tide then for the protection of south-west Tasmania and marked the beginning of the end of hydro development for Tasmania," Dr Crowley said.
But division over the dam debate is still felt in some places, according to Dr Crowley.
"The [Tasmanian] Labor party has never recovered … there are personalities within the party who are still bitter about it," she said.
