Crook Inn

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The Crook Inn, 2006

The Crook Inn is an inn in the Scottish Borders, near the village of Tweedsmuir on the A701 road between Broughton and Moffat. It is one of many claimants to be the oldest inn in Scotland. Robert Burns wrote "Willie Wastle's Wife" there. In the early 20th century a halt was built on the Talla Railway to serve it. The inn attracted much passing trade from the labourers who were building the Talla Reservoir, which the railway was built to serve.

The hotel was refurbished in 1936 in the then-current Art Deco style, and the hotel retains many of the features installed at that time. It has also, over the years, become a place of pilgrimage for members of the Porteous family, visiting the site of nearby Hawkshaw, their former ancestral home on the hills above Tweeddale and the Fruid reservoir. A reunion of Porteous family members is held at the inn every five years, attracting visitors from all over the world.

Recent plans (November 2006) to convert the historic inn into apartments have met with much local opposition, and the proposals will be subject to discussion by the Scottish Borders Council in 2007 ^[1].