Yandina is in the Sunshine Coast hinterland. The name originates from the Kabi language, "yan dhinang" meaning to "cross water by foot", marking the first upstream ford over the Maroochy River.
Aboriginal people have lived in the Yandina district for over 40,000 years. They belonged to the Gubbi Gubbi language group, which consisted of a number of tribes occupying traditional resource areas. Around Yandina, the Undandi tribal area was east of the present day railway line while the Nalbo area was west of the line. Legends, bora rings, pathways, grinding grooves, scarred trees and middens provide evidence of occupancy.
European settlement began in the 1850s and the town of Yandina was surveyed in 1870. It was the first town in the Maroochy district. Many of the original buildings and the heritage streetscape of Stevens Street have been preserved. The Anglican church, built initially as a community church and opened in 1880, is the oldest on the Sunshine Coast. It is part of the Anglican Diocese of Brisbane. The Yandina hotel dates back to 1889 and was relocated using rollers and a bullock team in 1891 when the railway came through town. In the same year, the post office was moved to the new railway station. Privately owned Koongalba homestead is on the National Heritage List and is one of several historic homes in town. Yandina was originally planned to be the centre of the shire but as the local sugar mill was built in Nambour, more and more people who worked there moved closer.
Yandina Baptist Church opened in 1921. The Baptist congregation had previously been using the Anglican church for their services. In January 1921 the Baptists purchased the former union church in Pomona to relocate it to Railway Street in Yandina. The opening ceremony was held on Wednesday 16 March 1921.
Yandina Provisional School opened on 14 November 1889. On 4 February 1902, it became Yandina State School. A preschool was added in 1974.
The early timber getters logged beech, cedar, bunya pine and flooded gum. The timber industry remained important until the 1970s when a shortage of timber forced the closure on the Yandina mill. The fertile land around Yandina has been used for beef and dairy cattle, fruit growing, sugar cane and ginger.
Yandina Presbyterian Church was officially opened on Saturday 30 November 1940.
Nambour & District Reds (or Nambour Reds) soccer club was established in 1974. In 1997 Nambour Reds merged with Yandina Eagles to create Nambour Yandina United.
The Buderim Ginger Factory in Yandina was opened in April 1980 and also operates as a tourist attraction.
The town was bypassed by the Bruce Highway July 1997.
Yandina Baptist Church celebrated its centenary in 2021.
Today, Yandina officially endures as the oldest continuously inhabited town on the Sunshine Coast.
Demographics
In the 2011 census, the locality of Yandina had a population of 2,221 people.
In the 2016 census, the locality of Yandina had a population of 2,371 people.
In the 2021 census, the locality of Yandina had a population of 3,073 people.
Yandina, being one of the Sunshine Coast's oldest communities, is a charming little subtropical town in a setting of hinterland and rural areas of fertile farmlands. It is a "Ginger Town", for its agronomical source and the Ginger Factory is the top tourist drawcard for factory tours and encounters with one of the world's finest products of ginger.
Yandina is located off the Bruce Highway section of exit 215. Yandina Station on the Nambour and Gympie North Line has passenger train services to Brisbane. Route 631 services Yandina for buses connecting Noosa Junction and Nambour.
^"1921 Yandina". Baptist Church Archives Queensland. Archived from the original on 26 November 2021. Retrieved 29 November 2021.
^"Yandina". Chronicle And North Coast Advertiser. Vol. XVII, no. 899. Queensland, Australia. 21 January 1921. p. 5. Archived from the original on 29 June 2022. Retrieved 30 November 2021 – via National Library of Australia.
^"Religious". The Brisbane Courier. No. 19, 707. Queensland, Australia. 19 March 1921. p. 7. Archived from the original on 29 June 2022. Retrieved 30 November 2021 – via National Library of Australia.
^"Yandina". Visit Sunshine Coast. Archived from the original on 27 September 2022. Retrieved 23 October 2023.
^"Late News Flashes". Truth. No. 2123. Queensland, Australia. 1 December 1940. p. 16. Archived from the original on 29 June 2022. Retrieved 14 December 2021 – via National Library of Australia.
^"Yandina Historic House". Yandina Historical information & Visitor Info Centre. Archived from the original on 30 November 2021. Retrieved 30 November 2021.
^Dederer, Claire (4 February 2008). "Outlaws in the Outback". Slate. Archived from the original on 24 October 2023. Retrieved 23 October 2023.
Further reading
Yandina and District Historical Project Group (1996), Yandina 125 years, 1871–1996, Yandina and District Historical Project Group, ISBN978-0-646-29201-4
Yandina State School Centenary Committee (1989), Yandina School centenary, Yandina State School Centenary Committee, ISBN978-0-7316-6663-8
Yandina Baptist Centenary Committee (5 June 2021), Harvesting a century of life : Yandina Baptist Church centenary (published 2021), ISBN978-0-9944686-1-1