The route now known as Oodnadatta Track was traversed for tens of thousands of years by Indigenous Australians, used as a trading route and with stops at the water sources, but there was no settlement at Oodnadatta itself.
Early European exploration
explored the region in 1859. The route surveyed by Stuart in his journeys was adopted as part of the Overland Telegraph Line route. Alfred Giles referred to a place called the Yellow Waterhole, or Angle Pole, later was known as Hookey's Waterhole, near Oodnadatta.
Telegraphs, camels, and railways
Angle Pole is the point near Oodnadatta where the direction of the telegraph line changed to a more northerly direction. It is near the Peake cattle station, also known as "The Peake", or Freeling Springs. The ruins of Peake telegraph station exist on the station today. Alfred Giles refers to his only meeting with the explorer Ernest Giles at "the Peake" in the 1870s. By the 1880s the telegraph route was being used by camel trains, led by "Afghan" cameleers, or "Ghans", as they became known, who were brought to Australia for the task of hauling goods into Central Australia for use by pioneer settlers. Many of the cameleers settled in Oodnadatta and Maree, some with families and some marrying Aboriginal women. In the 1880s, Angle Pole was identified as the proposed terminus for the extension of the Great Northern Railway. When the railway was built, a town was established here, and in October 1890 was proclaimed a government township and renamed Oodnadatta. In 1889, Angle Pole was also proposed as the southeastern terminus of a land grant railway from Roebuck Bay in Western Australia. This railway was proposed by a London syndicate and would have been about 1000 miles long, with the wider gauge. However this was never built. The town remained the terminus of the Great Northern until the line was extended to Alice Springs in 1929. The line became known as the Central Australia Railway and the train service on the line was known as the Ghan in honour of the Afghan cameleers. The railway was built with narrow gauge tracks, and train traffic was frequently disrupted by washouts and other damage to the trackbed, leading to a slow and unreliable service. The railway through Oodnadatta was closed and a new standard gauge line was built to the west, bypassing Oodnadatta, and opening in October 1980. Following the closure of the railway line in 1981, Oodnadatta, formerly a government service centre and supply depot for surrounding pastoral properties, became a residential freehold town for Aboriginal people who, moving from cattle work, bought empty houses as railway workers left.
Oodnadatta's busiest era was World War II when the Australian Army and the Royal Australian Air Force set up local facilities to service troop trains and fighter aircraft en route to Darwin.
21st century
Tourist traffic along the Oodnadatta Track and the mining industry keep the village alive. The Aboriginal school is the biggest employer. In 2018, the federal government announced a major upgrade to the Track, to better serve both the tourists and truck drivers on this major freight and cattle transport route.
Access, facilities, attractions
Oodnadatta can be reached by an unsealed road from Coober Pedy or via the unsealed Oodnadatta Track from Marree to Marla or from the north via Finke/Aputula, NT. The Pink Roadhouse provides petrol, a general store, meals, a variety of accommodation, and post office facilities. The Transcontinental Hotel, built in the 1890s, is on the same side of the road, as is the caravan park. Oodnadatta is serviced twice weekly by the Coober Pedy Oodnadatta One Day Mail Run. The OKAmail truck also carries some general freight and passengers. The air strip, originally built for use in World War II is due for an upgrade in 2019 to repair and reseal the runway.
The population of Oodnadatta numbered 204 in 2016. Aboriginal and/or Torres Strait Islander people made up 53.3% of the population. This represented a decrease since 2006, when there were 277 people, of whom less than half were Indigenous. In 2016, 61.7% of people spoke only English at home. Other languages spoken included Yankunytjatjara 4.7%, Luritja 3.6%, Afrikaans 1.6%, Tagalog 1.6% and Pitjantjatjara 1.6%.
Oodnadatta Aboriginal School
The Oodnadatta Aboriginal School, located in Kutaya Terrace, is a school operated by the Government of South Australia offering education from Reception to Year 12. In 2018, the school had a total enrolment of 14 students, of whom 86% were indigenous, and a teaching staff of three.
Climate
Oodnadatta has a hot desert climate and has also recorded the highest reliably measured maximum temperature in Australia: 50.7 °C on 2 January 1960. A higher temperature was recorded at Cloncurry in 1889; however, this has since been shown to have been recorded in a non-standard enclosure and likely to have been considerably cooler than first believed. There is a large sign in Oodnadatta claiming the town is "The driest town, the driest state of the driest Continent".
