Oodla Wirra, South Australia
Town in South Australia
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Oodla Wirra (formerly Penn) is a small town in the upper Mid North of South Australia. It is on the Barrier Highway approximately halfway from Adelaide to Broken Hill.
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Oodla Wirra | |||||||||||||
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Halfway Hotel at Oodla Wirra | |||||||||||||
  Oodla Wirra | |||||||||||||
| Coordinates: 32°52′59″S 139°03′47″E[1] | |||||||||||||
| Country | Australia | ||||||||||||
| State | South Australia | ||||||||||||
| Region | Yorke and Mid North[1] | ||||||||||||
| LGA | |||||||||||||
| Location |
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| Established | 1889 | ||||||||||||
| Government | |||||||||||||
| • State electorate | |||||||||||||
| Elevation | 505 m (1,657 ft) | ||||||||||||
| Population | |||||||||||||
| • Total | 5 (SAL 2021)[3] | ||||||||||||
| County | Herbert[1] | ||||||||||||
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When the railway was built in 1880, a siding was provided, named Oodla Wirra. Soon after, a town was surveyed near the siding, but it was named Penn. This naming conflict continued until 1940, when the town was renamed Oodla Wirra, to match the railway station.[4][5]
Railway
Oodla Wirra is a former railway town, as it was on the narrow-gauge railway between Port Pirie and Cockburn (where it connected to the Silverton Tramway to Broken Hill). When the Commonwealth Government replaced the narrow gauge line with a standard gauge line, the revised route passed south and east of the town.
A railway employee was killed in a shunting accident in the Oodla Wirra railyards in 1909.[6]
In 1889, ironstone flux was mined from a failed silver mine a few miles away, and carted to Oodla Wirra to be transported by rail to the smelters at Port Pirie.[7]
The town later boasted a flour mill, school and hotel named Halfway way hotel as it was halfway between Adelaide and Broken Hill.[8]
