The single best place to understand the layered history of the Comox Valley. The collections cover the Vancouver Island coal industry, the largely-vanished Chinese and Japanese communities (the original Chinatown of Cumberland had 3,000 residents at its peak), and the bitter 1912-14 Vancouver Island Coal Strike that helped end the era of indentured immigrant labour.
A short walking trail from the museum leads through the woods to the foundations of the Chinatown and Japantown buildings, with interpretive signs explaining what each structure once was.