About our Sub-Section
From our archives.
The name “Sandgate Sub-Section” of the Naval Association of Australia Incorporated has an interesting history.
Prior to 1954 there was only a Queensland Section to cover all of Queensland and this was quite inadequate.
In 1954 some of the Queensland Section members formed the Sandgate Sub-Section and the remaining members changed the Queensland Section name into the “Brisbane” Sub-Section.
A State Council was formed with officers elected from members of the two sub-sections and the first State Conference was held at the Naval Depot in 1955, hosted by Brisbane Sub-Section.
In 1972 “Northside” was added to the Sandgate name because a new sub-section called “Bramble Bay” was formed in the Sandgate area.
In 1985, because of the name problems they were having with the Australian Naval Cadets unit that had formed on the Woody Point side of Bramble Bay, the Sub-Section changed its name to “Bramble Bay-Sandgate”.
In 1988 Northside Sandgate Sub-Section decided to change their venue of meetings to the Kedron-Wavell Services Club and they changed their name to “Northside-Wavell Sub-Section”.
This meant that the original name of “Sandgate” was dropped after 34 years.
In 1989 Bramble Bay-Sandgate Sub-Section dropped “Bramble Bay” from their name so once again the stand-alone name of “Sandgate Sub-Section” was back on the list of Queensland Sub-Sections.
Not long afterwards the Northside-Wavell Sub-Section folded with the members transferring to Sandgate and Brisbane Sub-Sections to name but two.
So the name “Sandgate Sub-Section” can lay claim to being the name of the first Naval Association Sub-Section formed in Queensland and the present Sandgate Sub-Section is striving to uphold the values and traditions that were established many years ago by those shipmates who went before us.
Darby Ashton
President
Naval Association of Australia (Sandgate Sub-Section) Incorporated
president@navalassociationsandgate.org.au
