The Russell Museum is a small but well-curated community museum that provides the historical context for everything you see in the town. The centrepiece is a one-fifth scale model of HMS Endeavour — Captain Cook's vessel, which called into the Bay of Islands on his first voyage — built by local craftspeople over many years.
The museum covers the full arc of Russell's history: from Māori settlement and pre-European contact, through the whaling and sealing era, the founding of the mission churches, the treaty period, and Hone Heke's wars. The staff are knowledgeable and genuinely enthusiastic. Allow an hour; it is worth it before visiting the other sites in town, as it provides the narrative thread that connects them.