Pagham Yacht Club - A History
This is a reproduction of an article published in PYC’s 1994 30th anniversary handbook
The seeds of our club were sown in 1963 on Pagham Lagoon by a small but enthusiastic group of dinghy owners, calling themselves the Little Tern Club, and teaching themselves to sail and race in an assortment of boats. Three of these sailors, Doug Witheyman, Doug Moorey and George Greenhow joined forces with Ken Charlwood and John Gyngell to form Pagham Yacht Club, using John’s bungalow, Whitehorses, as the initial committee room. Ken Charlwood became Pagham Yacht Club’s first Commodore at that meeting in May 1964.
As the membership grew rapidly, a meeting place was urgently needed. Enora Latham, the then owner of Pagham Club, came to our rescue in 1965, not only in allowing the use of her premises for our socialising, but the use of the rear door to her club toilets (for a fee), and this was much appreciated on race days!
Changing facilities were rather basic in those days and it was a case of struggling into or out of sailing gear, either in your car or behind a bush in the grounds of Pagham Club. A privileged few used a spare room in Whitehorses.
By 1966, the size of the membership and the numbers of boats parked on the beach in front of Whitehorses, dictated that we needed our own premises and a boat park if the club was to continue its growth. Later that year we negotiated the use of a piece of ground owned by Pagham Beach Holdings and, in 1967, erected the Old Clubhouse, which cost £70 and was an unwanted scout hut in Siddlesham. A working party dismantled it and transported it to Pagham in one weekend. Rebuilding it took a little longer.
During the next nine years the club grew from strength to strength, and the boat park was usually full with anglers’ boats and sailing dinghies. National Championships, Open Meetings and Regattas were all attended by a large number of entrants, putting PYC firmly on the sailing map. At one memorable regatta, 70+ entrants were recorded.
Social events were always well attended, despite still having no toilets in-house, or a bar in the clubhouse! Members supplied their own drinks, beer being handed in on arrival and poured into a large tea urn and one helped oneself from the tap!
All surplus cash was injected into the Building fund, which was formed in 1974, as it was the ambition to one day have a bricks and mortar yacht club in sight of the sea.
In May 1975, and with this dream in mind, the commodore at that time, the late David Turton and his wife at the time, now Cynthia Bourne, knocked on the door of ‘Sea Shells’, No. 1 West Front Road, and asked the surprised occupants if they wished to sell, since the site was ideal for PYC. Surprisingly, the owners agreed to sell fairly quickly, but there was not nearly enough cash in the kitty, David had to stall the purchase until sufficient funds were available. An intense fundraising program then ensued over the following nine months, with money coming in from loans from members and the National Playing Fields Association, and a grant from the Sports Council which took six months to negotiate. Profit from well attended social events added to the kitty which was sufficient to purchase the freehold of the bungalow by January 1976, and internal alterations started immediately.
By the start of the 1976 sailing season the clubhouse was functional, and after gradual improvements it was officially opened by Jack Holt on 28th May 1977.
A further year of fundraising, now assisted by the presence of a bar, enabled David Brooks and Ted Ecclestone, both skilled craftsmen, to start building the extension to the beach frontage. Assisted by a gang of willing labourers, it was finished in record time.
The Yacht Club as you see it today is unique by way of its position on the beach, and because it is one of few freehold yacht clubs on the South Coast. As with all buildings, costly maintenance is always required, so we should try to treat our clubhouse kindly - a lot of it is still held together with blood, sweat and tears.
As a footnote to this potted history of PYC we feel that there are many club members, some still with us, and some sadly departed, with names too many to mention, who contributed many hours of work and dedication, without which Pagham Yacht Club, as we know it would not exist today.