Hot Springs, Arkansas: A Healing City Built on Water, History, and Reinvention

Hot Springs, Arkansas: A Healing City Built on Water, History, and Reinvention

By:  a.d. elliott | Take the Back Roads - Art and Other Odd Adventures

 Dear Henry,

This week, in an effort to calm myself down, I drove to Hot Springs, Arkansas. Because really, is one supposed to do when diagnosed with a chronic illness besides take the waters?

Hot Springs National Park has always been a place of healing. Long before it was a town or a destination, the springs were used by the Caddo, Osage, and Quapaw, who regarded the site as sacred, neutral ground. The waters were not a novelty; they were medicine.

Euro-American presence followed the Louisiana Purchase in 1803. The springs were reserved from private sale in 1807 and federally protected in 1832, making Hot Springs the first federally protected land in what would become the United States’ national park system. Early settlement consisted of tents, boarding houses, and crude bathing structures, less a town than a temporary village built around care.

The real boom began in the late nineteenth century. Industrialization was well underway, and with it came chronic overuse injuries, respiratory illnesses, and a kind of exhaustion medicine had not yet learned how to treat. When the railroad reached Hot Springs in 1877, taking the cure became accessible to ordinary Americans, not just the wealthy or determined. The city grew quickly around a single purpose: convalescence.

Around the 1890s, Hot Springs gained another layer of national attention when Major League Baseball teams began using the city for spring training. Players came to condition, rehabilitate injuries, and prepare for the season. Baseball brought crowds, money, and betting, which in turn opened the door to organized crime. For a time, Hot Springs carried a whiff of vice alongside its reputation for healing—an early, uneasy blend of health resort and entertainment town.

The decline came after World War II. Antibiotics and modern hospital care replaced long-term convalescence, and the pharmaceutical model of medicine left little room for months spent resting, bathing, and walking. As the "cure culture" collapsed, bathhouses closed, hotels emptied, and the city drifted through decades of decline and stagnation from the 1960s into the late 1990s.

Beginning in the 1990s and continuing into the present, Hot Springs began to reinvent itself. Some bathhouses reopened; others were repurposed as museums, breweries, and boutiques. The city leaned into its history, cultivating a modern “spa” culture that, while not the same as the old cure, still nods toward its healing roots.

Despite the Arlington Hotel's popularity (and resort atmosphere), I chose not to stay there. Instead, I stayed at The Waters Hotel, a building constructed in 1913 not as a grand resort, but as a practical home for long-term patients. This would have been closer to the experience most visitors actually had. The hotel sits directly across from Bathhouse Row and the Grand Promenade, with easy access to doctors’ offices, restaurants, and the daily rhythms of the cure. It is one of the few historic hotels that survived the city’s downturn, and for a time, it showed it. Hilton became involved in 2019, undertaking a full renovation and reopening the property in 2021 as part of its Tapestry Collection. This is my second stay in one of those hotels (the other was in Savannah), and I’ve been impressed by how thoughtfully Hilton has handled historic restoration. They’ve done similarly careful work with the Skirvin in Oklahoma City.

I didn’t take the waters, though I did sample them. Hyperthyroid conditions can be aggravated by heat and steam, so I avoided immersion entirely and deliberately chose the quietest part of the season to visit. The city was calm. I walked the promenade, tasted the spring water, and let the trip be a leisurely stroll through layers of history, medical, mobster, and, unexpectedly, wax museums (which I will explain later).

I also discovered a wonderful little place, Diablos Tacos and Mezcal, and indulged more than planned. Breakfast at The Pancake Shop was equally worth it. Both are firmly recommended.

In short, it was a good getaway, and a surprisingly rich historical one.

xoxo a.d. elliott

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About the Author
a.d. elliott is a wanderer, photographer, and storyteller traveling through life

She shares her journeys at Take the Back Roads, explores new reads at Rite of Fancy, and highlights U.S. military biographies at Everyday Patriot.

You can also browse her online photography gallery at shop.takethebackroads.com.

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