The museum is located in the former Moonta Mines Model School, erected in 1878. The school remained an active and important centre for the Moonta Mines community for ninety years and closed in 1968.
The National Trust of SA, Moonta Branch took over the building and established a museum which now tells the story of Cornish pioneers who came to South Australia for the copper mines 1861-1923.
The museum has 14 rooms and houses thematic displays on the Cornish miners’ lifestyles – mining, lodges and friendly societies, sports and pastimes, death and hardship, extensive displays of costumes, china, silverware, photographs and memorabilia and a classroom furnished c.1900.