Managed by the Beachport branch of the National Trust of South Australia, the museum is located in what was a shipping house and warehouse built in 1879 using local freestone with sawn Coraline limestone quoins.
features displays about the local fishing industry, whaling, agricultural history and the Buandik people. The whaling display includes harpoons, bones and interpretive display panels that tell the stories of Beachport’s whaling past. Other displays include a large group of heavy agriculture machinery, wood working hand tools, a complete collection of electrical insulators used in the Melbourne to Darwin overland telegraph line and an extensive display of rabbit traps. A smithy shop is set up showing working conditions as though the smithy has just left the building. A 1920s school room is complete with teacher and two student mannequins and books and writing materials over the ages, photographs and blackboard exercises.
A display focusing on the interactions between the Buandik Indigenous people and Beachport’s European settlers opened in 2011 while a new exhibit telling the story of the Rivoli Bay railway line complemented by SA Railways memorabilia from the past opened in 2016.
Several upstairs rooms have been set up as they were when used for accommodation in the early 1900s as a kitchen, music and dining rooms and bedrooms. Upstairs displays include cooking implements and clothing.