Yacka. St James Anglican Church. Architect William Mallyon. Opened 1900 and still in use.

Yacka.

This prettily sited town’s name should not be confused with Yacka Grass Trees (Xanthorrhoea semiplana) or Yakka menswear and work wear clothing! Its name comes from a local Ngadjuri words meaning “sister to the big river” which John Bristow Hughes used for his pastoral lease taken out in the early 1840s which he called Bundaleer. The big river is the Broughton River and the river here was known to the Ngadjuri as Yackamoorundie. So John Bristow Hughes chose the name Yackamoorundie for his pastoral run. Hence the town when established in 1870 was called Yacka. Like so many SA agricultural towns it was part of the 1870s closer settlement and farming push. The Hundred of Yackamoorundie was declared in 1869 and it was part of the lands covered by the 1869 Strangways Act which allowed purchase of farming blocks on credit rather than the full amount on the fall of the hammer at a public auction. This was the Redhill to Yacka declared Agricultural area. In 1872 the Strangways Act was amended and farmers could buy land anywhere in the state with only a 10% deposit required at auction. The Strangways Act required 20% deposit on the fall of the hammer. The town only began developing from 1873 because of this 1872 amendment act but also because it was so far from a railhead. The town plan had a modified Goyder grid pattern with north, south, west and east terraces but it was not a perfect grid because of the Broughton River. It was surrounded by 20 acre suburban faming lots beyond the parklands which were used for tethering town cows and horses. The town blocks sold for around £5, the suburban 20+ acre blocks sold for about £2 per acre and the general farming 80 acre blocks for £1 per acre. But the first buyers of town lots in 1870 were land speculators and none took up residence in the town or built on the land. One was Charles hawker of Bungaree Station. Charles Hawker bought 1,300 acres of freehold land in the Hundred of Yackamoorundie when it was first surveyed. To prevent the large pastoralist from buying up large areas of freehold farming land the 1872 act limited purchases to 640 acre blocks or eight standard sections of land. Perhaps because of Charles Hawker’s influence the main street, now the Horrocks Highway, is Hawker Street and the cross street by the Institute is Charles Street. Most town blocks in Yacka sold in 1874 or later. As the town was at a crossing point of the Broughton River on the trail from Clare to Gladstone it soon began to develop and prosper.

 

The first public building was Mr Witcomb’s hotel which opened in 1873 followed by the wonderful Institute in 1876 planned to be opened on the same day as a new bridge across the Broughton River. A crowd of 300 people witness the opening of the bridge and the Institute. The Institute building was paid for by the time of its opening and rates were set at 2/6 pence a quarter for using the Institute library. This charming towered Institute is on the Register of the National Estate. The Wesleyan Methodists had purchased a block in the town for a church in 1875 but that was not erected and opened until 1881. The wooden primary school started up in 1877 as by that time there were 48 school age children in the town. From 1877 onwards regular meetings were held in the Institute to pressure for a railway to Yacka. The town wanted the rail line from Blyth extended to Yacka and Gladstone or the line from Kadina extended through Snowtown to Yacka. The government bided its time and the rail line was not extended until 1894 when it went north through Brinkworth and Yacka to Gladstone. The town got a wooden flat roofed railway station. By 1879 the town had general stores, a butcher, hotel, post office, church, school, Institute and a number of residences. Church services were being held in the Institute for the Catholics, Anglicans, Lutherans and Presbyterians. In 1885 a second better bridge was opened across the Broughton River. An Anglican Church was built in 1894 to the architectural design of William Mallyon the bank manager of Port Pirie who also designed the Redhill and Koolunga Anglia Churches. But it was not consecrated by the Bishop until 1901.

 

Throughout the 1870s and 1880s the town suffered from regular floods and outbreaks of infected water causing typhoid and dysentery with fatal consequences. This was put into the past when the town got reticulated water from Bundaleer Reservoir in 1902. By this time Yacka was well established with reticulated water, a railway, and a strong business and residential community and from 1912 a new stone and brick school room. In 1915 a wider, six span cement bridge was opened across the Broughton River by the Governor of the day. After World War One a war memorial was erected outside the Institute in 1921. In 1926 the narrow gauge railway line was converted to a broad gauge line to Gladstone and this necessitated a new stronger railway bridge across the Broughton River. It opened in 1927 as did a new Post Office. In 1929 the former Savings Bank of South Australia near the Institute opened. Opposite the Institute is the old butcher shop and on the next corner is the former Yacka Hotel. The Wesleyan Methodist Church now the Uniting Church is in the street behind the Institute and the Anglican Church is in the western part of Broughton Street and the 1912 former school is in the eastern part of Broughton Street. The former Post Office is at 12 Broughton Street and the late 19th century blacksmith shop with the double arched doors is across from the former Saving Bank. In recent years Yacka has been in decline as a result of rural depopulation. The Bluebird rail service to Gladstone ceased in 1982 and goods trains ceased in 1989; the Post Office closed in 1991; the Yacka hotel closed in 1994; and the school closed in the late 1990s. The railway though Yacka to Gladstone converted to broad gauge in 1927.

 

Done