The National Coal Mining Museum for England is based at the site of Caphouse Colliery in Overton, Wakefield, West Yorkshire, England. It opened in 1988 as the Yorkshire Mining Museum and was granted national status in 1995. History Caphouse Colliery was sunk in the 1770s or 1780s and the Hope Pit in the 1820s. Sir John Lister Kaye of Denby Grange took over James Milnes' leases the mineral rights in 1827 and his pits became the Denby Grange Colliery. The boiler house and stone and brick chimney at the museum are Grade II listed structures built around 1876 for Emma Lister Kaye along with the steam winding engine house, boiler yard, heapstead and ventilation shaft which are Grade II* listed. The boiler house has two Lancashire boilers and powered the winding engine. The timber headgear at Caphouse and the wood framed screens building at Hope Pit date from between 1905 and 1911. Pithead baths and an administration block were built between 1937 and 1938. Lockwood and Elliott who owned Shuttle Eye Colliery had acquired the colliery by 1942. The colliery was nationalised in 1947 and a drift mine opened in 1974. The colliery closed in 1985. The Yorkshire Mining Museum opened in 1988 and the museum became the National Coal Mining Museum in 1995.In October 2022 the museum staff voted to strike over a below inflation pay offer. Museum The museum offers guided underground tours where visitors can experience the conditions miners worked in and see the tools and machines they used as the industry and the mine developed through the years. Above ground, the museum sits on a semi-rural site, with over a dozen galleries documenting the social and industrial history of the mines. The extensive library and archive contains a first edition of De re Metallica, as well as issues of "Coal News" and details of collieries throughout England. There are numerous other original features on site, including the pit head baths, steam winding house, boiler house and coal screening plant. The site maintains an operating paddy train connecting the main Caphouse hub to the Hope Pit area of the site, where a natural Water Treatment facility with reed beds and bird hides is operated in partnership with the Coal Authority. There is also an interpretive nature trail connecting the wooded valley area of the site. The museum has had many developments in recent years. The Miners Memorial