1968

In `Marshland Adventure' by J Wentworth Day, published 1950, he describes a long, low, red-brick house, standing on the edge of the green staithe, that was some two hundred years ago called the WHERRYMAN'S ARMS.  Here` the wherry skippers went ashore and drank deep and waxed uproarious. It was a sort of smugglers den, for they still tell tales of their illicit cargoes and of rough doings....... loose women, one or two or a whole squadron of apple cheeked frailties - who came down to this remote rough inn and ministered to the rougher men.... So it perhaps because the Inn was too soft and welcoming that the house was closed.'
He goes on to relate that Basil Hitchen had` took and shook it and made it the most welcoming place' called the Staithe Hotel and Country Club. `It was full of good old furniture and nice winking bits of brass, of ships' lanterns and marine and agricultural relics. Here you could dine, sleep, fish or shoot from it, or merely sit and drink beer, listening to the old wherrymen or good marsh farmers.'
It was said that thirty years before, Sutton Broad came right up to the doorway and there were acres of open water. By 1950 there was not a quarter of an acre.

A Country Club in 1930's & 1940's

 Full licence from c1964?

Recommended in D. A. Yates guide 1970,
has also appeared in an Egon Ronay guide.