Russell Museum

Displays

The function of the Museum is to collect and preserve, exhibit and interpret, and to undertake research on people and events in Russell’s history. Major upgrades to Russell Museum took place from 2002 onwards. Richard Wolfe, specialist museum design consultant, worked...
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Īpipiri

Russell Museum now has a great new exhibit on display for visitors to experience, an interactive digital map called Īpipiri. Īpipiri is the Māori name for the Eastern Bay of Islands, and the mapping table now joins Captain Cook’s Endeavour as a museum must see attraction. Great...
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The Story of Managahāwea

Russell Museum’s new exhibition, The Story of Managahāwea is a fascinating look at an extremely early site of first arrivals from Polynesia. Beneath the soil of its beautiful beachfront, archaeological evidence from a series of excavations under the leadership of Ngāti...
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Maori

The Bay of Islands was settled by Maori in voyaging canoes almost a thousand years ago. Russell, known by its original name Kororareka, was one of a number of small coastal settlements, whose numbers increased seasonally as inland Maori came to the coast to fish. Originally...
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Endeavour

Explorers Captain James Cook gave the Bay of Islands its English name when he visited in 1769. He anchored off Motuarohia just around the Kororareka headland with a crew of scientists, botanists and Tupaia a High Priest navigator from Polynesia. Impressed with what he found, he...
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"Russell Museum - Te Whare Taonga o Kororāreka"

Telling the stories of Īpipiri Bay of Islands

The Story of Managahāwea

Russell Museum’s new exhibition, The Story of Managahāwea is a fascinating look at an extremely early site of first arrivals from Polynesia. Beneath the soil of its beautiful beachfront, archaeological evidence from a series of excavations under the leadership of Ngāti Kuta has shown that some of the earliest people to come to Aotearoa arrived and settled here.

Īpipiri

Russell Museum now has a great new exhibit on display for visitors to experience, an interactive digital map called Īpipiri. Īpipiri is the Māori name for the Eastern Bay of Islands, and the mapping table now joins Captain Cook’s Endeavour as a museum must see attraction. Great fun for the kids, its two animated re-enactments brilliantly bring to life how our region and its ecology were first formed and developed.

Whaling

Because of good reports from early European visitors, Kororāreka became a popular base for visiting Pacific whalers who needed a base to pick up supplies, get repairs done, and give their men shore time. For nearly a hundred years whalers, particularly American, visited the port. Kororāreka changed to accommodate their needs with waterfront grog shops and brothels a feature. It had quite the reputation.