The Royal Pump Room is a Grade II listed building, which houses the town's museum - operated by Harrogate Borough Council. It was formerly a spa water pump house. Today the Pump Room consists of both the original 1842 stone rotunda and a glazed annexe which was opened in 1913.
The Pump Room offered guests of the town an all-weather facility where they could drink sulphur water which was pumped on site from a natural spring known as the Old Sulphur Well. Almost 100 springs have been recorded in Harrogate, the evidence of some of them can be seen in the beautiful Valley Gardens opposite. The strong sulphur water was once bottled and exported as medicinal spring water for consumption throughout the country.
Betty Lupton (1760 - 1843) dispensed Strong Sulphur Water from a well at the Pump Room's present site for 6 decades. She was given the honorary title 'Queen of the Well' in 1837!
Harrogate's first mineral spring was discovered in 1571 by William Slingsby. Towards the end of the 17th century, more springs in Harrogate had been discovered. For centuries, visitors flocked to Harrogate to taste the healing waters - among them the likes of Charles Dickens and Tsar Nicholas II of Russia, but in 2012, EU regulations ruled them unfit for human consumption. Now, as part of a major transformation of the Royal Pump Room, the question of whether we should be able to drink the water again is back on the agenda.....