A historic city centre pub dating back to the 19th century opens its doors as a specialist real-ale free house on Friday.

The opening marks a turning point for the Jacobs Well pub, at the bottom of Manchester Road, which was closed for nearly a year and was boarded up and empty until pub owner William Wagstaff decided to buy it.

Now Mr Wagstaff, the owner-licensee of the New Beehive Inn in Westgate for 24 years, plans to replicate the success of his other pub, the Shakespeare's Inn, in Sheffield, which has just won the Camra Pub of the Year Award in the city.

The Jacobs Well pub, which will be known as Jacobs, dates back to 1830 when the first landlord was called Jacob. It remained standing when many buildings around it were demolished and has had a major refurbishment and hopes to attract many new customers, as well as former regulars.

Mr Wagstaff has appointed a new manager, Graham Hardy, and there will be regular acoustic nights.

He said: “Quite a lot of people have already said they are interested in coming down.

“It has been given a complete overhaul. It is a lot smarter and lighter and we have been here since the end of February.

“Everybody I have spoken to has a tale about it. It is quite an important pub.

“It has been very important in everybody’s lives. People started courting here, or had their first pint here and I think most people, at some time, have spent a lot of their time in here in years gone by.

“I think it is one of those iconic Bradford pubs where it is a little cottage-type pub in the middle of a great metropolis.

“This pub is in the heart of it. It is the only building left on the street and has quite a lot of history here.

“I think it has been saved because of the value of it – everything else was knocked down, but this managed to stay up.

“This was Number 14, and there must have been quite a few ordinary properties on this street.

“The first landlord who started in 1830 was called Jacob.”

Mr Wagstaff took the pub over on February 26 and is recruiting people with knowledge of specialist real ales and unusual ciders.