An iconic family business founded in Harrogate on 17th July 1919 by a young Swiss confectioner, Fritz Bützer, who changed his name to Frederick Belmont. The first Bettys Café Tea Room opened near this site at 9 Cambridge Crescent. In 1962 Bettys purchased C E Taylor & Co., tea and coffee merchants and opened Bettys flagship branch in this building, in what was previously Taylors Café Imperial. Our Swiss-Yorkshire heritage lives as strongly as ever; though to this day, the identity of ‘Betty’ remains a mystery.

Bettys Cafe Tea Rooms was founded here in 1919.

Inns were established near the Old Sulphur Well shortly after the 1626 appearance of Edmund Deane’s book “Spadacrene Anglica”, Cold bath Road – originally Robin Hood Lane – being an important coaching route for visitors to the Spa. The White Hart was probably established by 1734 when Dr. Short praised the nearby Cold Well in his study of British Spas. In 1847, the Thackwray family commissioned a Leeds builder named Atack to rebuild the inn to a design by celebrated railway architect George. T. Andrews, whose superbly crisp neoclassic façade was later described by Sir Nikolaus Pevsner as Harrogate’s finest building, with “nothing gaudy or showy about it”. At the outbreak of war in 1939 the White Hart was requisitioned by the government and occupied by the Air Ministry until peace time, when it was intended for hospital use I an unrealised scheme to make Harrogate the UK centre for the study and treatment of rheumatism. In 1949, the White hart was acquired by the Leeds Regional Hospital Board for use as a hospital annex and training centre, which closed in 1970. After being acquired by the Post Office, who in 1973 attempted to demolish it to extend their telephone exchange, the White Hart was bought by the University of York and eventually converted into a hotel, which the present owners have restored to its former glory.

In 1815, Nicholas Carter senior built the first house on Prospect Hill as a home and premises for the sale of wine and spirits and the accommodation of guests. Known as “Carter’s” and then as the “Prospect”, the building was often enlarged as the hotel thrived. In 1859,the section at the corner of James Street was rebuilt and further extended in 1879 which doubled the hotel’s length, adding a tall tower and elaborate iron-work. A meeting here on 24th February 1883 resulted in a successful petition to Parliament for the Incorporation of the town as a Borough, Nicholas Carter junior becoming the town’s first mayor. On 29th October 1892, Samson Fox gave a spectacular banquet to mark the end of his third term as Mayor. Before the Great War, the Prospect Hotel was patronised largely by the aristocracy, including the Duke and Duchess of Wellington, who stayed here regularly. During the Great War, the hotel was a centre of support for Belgian refugees, one of whom became its General Manager. In 1920, the hotel sold Harrogate Borough Council 1,980 square yards of its garden as site for the new War Memorial, unveiled in 1923. The Carter family sold the business in 1936 to Scarborough Hotelier Edgar Robinson who shortened the building by demolishing the section obstructing James Street, and added an extra storey. During World War Two, the hotel was occupied by large numbers of military personnel dispersed by the London blitz. By 1945, the hotel accommodated nearly 300 Ministry of Aircraft employees. On re-opening after the war, the hotel traded under its old name, but in 1988 it became the “Imperial” and then in 2006, the “Yorkshire”.

Harrogate’s first theatre was built in c. 1765 at no. 3 Devonshire Place, opposite the fashionable Dragon Hotel. By 1769, boxes cost 3s/-, pit seats 2s/- and the gallery 1s/-. The building’s size may have been responsible for its early closure by c. 1776, when theatrical productions moved into the Granby Hotel’s barn before moving in 1788 to the new Church Square Theatre. By July 1782, this building was known as the King’s Arms Inn, but in June 1784, it was bought by John Harrison of the New Hummums, Covent Garden, and converted into Harrison’s Hotel, Coffee House and Inn. In the nineteenth century it was in residential use, and known variously as Gable House, or Devonshire House, one owner being the celebrated Leeds architect George Corson. When the land was acquired by Amos Chippindale in c. 1894, he surrounded it with his Regent estate development. Used in the 20th c. for commercial purposes, the building was purchased in 2016 by John Harr Properties and converted into seven apartments in 2017-9.

In the hour of peril people of Harrogate earned the gratitude of the British Nations sustaining the valour of the Royal Air Force and fortifying the cause of freedom by the gift of Spitfire Aircraft. They shall mount up with wings as eagles. Issued by the Ministry of Aircraft Production 1941. Restored in 2020 to commemorate the 80th Anniversary of the Battle of Britain.

Dr. Kathleen E. H. Rutherford MBE, local GP, Honorary Freeman of the Borough and Founder President of the Soroptimist Club of Harrogate. A committed Quaker and humanitarian, who worked tirelessly nationally and internationally to aid women and children in Naples’ slums, a Ugandan leper colony, war torn Biafra, Algerian clinics and refugee camps in Jerusalem. She made large donations to charities and was invited to China with other doctors to share medical advances and promote global understanding. St. Mungo was her home and the family medical practice.

Born in Trieste of Hungarian parents, Simon first studied art in Budapest before the First World War. Leaving Hungary in 1920, his post-impressionism embraced life in Italy, Switzerland & France. He met Patricia Frayling in London, where they married in 1937. In 1941 they moved to Ramsgill, then Harrogate, living at 4 Park Road from 1952-1968. He taught at Harrogate School of Art.

The Club was established in 1857 in a room at Gascoigne’s Hotel, Devonshire Place, as a gathering place for the town’s professional classes and moved to this purpose-built building in 1886. Though originally for gentlemen only, today Club membership is open to all. Its primary aim is to be a social hub where fellowship is enjoyed in a safe and pleasant environment. To preserve and enhance The Club’s Victorian heritage, a programme of refurbishment commenced n 2015 to restore the lavish interiors.

The exclusive fashion house of Louis Copé occupied this building for nearly 60 Years after opening in 1918, its location between the Royal baths & Royal Hall making it ideal for the visitor trade. Customers included Queen Mary, her daughter Princess Mary (latterly Princess Royal and Countess of Harewood), and local gentry, who attended the fashion shows hosted at the store & the Royal hall. The designers and workrooms were upstairs, where all clothes were made on site. Cope established links with the major international fashion houses, with one of Louis’ daughters marrying into the prominent London fashion couturier of Ellis & Goldstein, the first company to create ready-made dresses for average height ladies of the day.

1804 – 1883. Pickersgill Palliser commissioned architect Richard Dyson in 1855 to build nos 8 & 9 Royal Parade, with ground floor shops & model apartments above, where he lived and worked for several years. Palliser established Harrogate’s first printing press in 1835 at 1 Northumberland Court, before moving it to 31 Devonshire Place by 1837, when he was also appointed as Harrogate’s first Post master. He founded the Harrogate Advertiser in 1836, and also gave exemplary service as Treasurer for the Royal Bath Hospital between 1826 – 1880.

The Obelisk Inn, developed to serve trade on the mid-18th c. turnpike rods, was rebuilt by 1838 and named the “Commercial”. It was an important stop for mail and passenger coaches, and thrived after 1848 thanks to the opening of the nearby Brunswick Railway Station. After 1878, the Inn was adopted for social gatherings by the world’s first Cyclists’ Touring Club, until a prank caused their expulsion. Re-named the “West Park” in 1899, the current custodians, Provenance Inns, thoroughly refurbished the building into a luxury boutique hotel in 2013-14.

The Chapel stands on land, formerly part of the Franklin estate, which was developed after the 1864 dedication of the Cemetery, nearby Grove House giving its name to the road. Urbanisation increased after 1878, when architects H. E. & A. Bown produced plans for the estate, which were realised by local builders. In 1892, the Wesleyan Methodists opened a Sunday School at 55 Grove Road, which soon led to calls for a larger chapel to serve the growing community, and on 18th May 1896, the foundation stone was laid for this lavishly detailed, galleried, Italianate show chapel, designed by W. J. Morley. It was opened on 8th June 1896. With space for a congregation of 700, and magnificent stained glass by Lazenby of Bradford, the new Chapel rapidly became a community focal point. A Sunday School was built in 1901, to the West of the Chapel, followed in 1929 with a School House. A century on, a dwindling congregation caused the Trustees to move to smaller premises, and the site was sold in 2013, leading to the restoration and conversion of the buildings to residential use by art collector Mark Hinchliffe.

Michael Rennie 1909 – 1971.

Internationally celebrated star of British and Hollywood films and television including ‘The day the Earth Stood Still’, ‘The Robe’ and ‘The Third Man’. He died in this family home on10th June 1971 after a career that began in 1936.

Klaatu barada nikto.

Mary Fisher lived for many years at this house in Mount Parade. She was active in public life as a JP, Conservative councillor from 1943 and later alderman. She became Harrogate’s first woman mayor in 1949. She also served on the Board of Guardians, as a governor of Harrogate Grammar School and Chairman of the Harrogate & District Society for the Blind. She supported the work for the deaf, the Girl Guides, the RNLI, and Soroptimist International. In 1958 she was awarded the MBE and in 1970 became an Honorary Freeman of the Borough of Harrogate.

Claude H. Verity 1880 – 1949
Businessman and inventor. Lived here 1920-1923, where he developed the Veritiphone, which synchronised sound recording with cinema film, in a secret first floor laboratory in a separate building at the rear of this property. It was publicly demonstrated with the film A Cup of Beef Tea from 28 April 1921 in the Royal Hall, attracting 5,600 people. He was unable to form a commercial company and in 1927, the Warner Bros. film The Jazz Singer, using the Vitaphone system, marked the widespread arrival of the talkies.