Mooroochie House

Did you know…????

Yandina was originally known as Native Dog Flat.

In early 1870 the Queensland Surveyor-General instructed another surveyor named William Fryer to explore and report on sites suitable for a town settlement.

On 11 August Fryer recommended a block of 100 acres that another settler named Henry Blakesley had previously selected but then forfeited. That land was known as Native Dog Flat.

It was ideally situated, halfway between the towns of Caboolture and Gympie, with a hotel, post office and police camp for the gold escort already established. The land was above flood level, the western side faced the Brisbane to Gympie Road, and the eastern and southern sides had port facilities on the Maroochy River. There was fresh water up-river for a future supply.

On 23 September 1870 Governor Samuel Blackall made Fryer’s recommendations legal and the proclamation of the new town was made in the Queensland Government Gazette.

The first commercial settlement was named Maroochie. The hotel, Mooroochie House, was built next to Yandina Post Office. James Low brought the name from a site opposite Dunethin Rock where he had first tried to establish a post office on the edge of Yandina Cattle Run. Some settlers said that the name Maroochie should take precedence over Yandina. After James Low died in 1883 his wife Christina Low, in charge of the post office, changed the name to Maroochie Post Office. When the railway opened in 1891 the post office relocated to the Yandina Railway Station with the name, Yandina Post Office.

The use of the name Yandina for the railway station meant that the town was no longer Maroochie or Native Dog Flat. The name Yandina originated from the district now called Yandina Creek and is an Aboriginal word meaning “go on foot”.