Naoero Museum
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The only museum on Nauru, using the original Nauruan language name for the island in its designation. It has lots of artefacts and historical photos on display, covering all the various aspects of Nauru’s troubled history, so is a must-see for any dark tourist.
More background info: for general historical background see under Nauru.
I haven’t been able to find solid information about how and when the museum came into being. One source claimed there was a predecessor from 1980 that closed in the 2000s, but I couldn’t corroborate that. Other sources give 2014 or, more often, 2019 as the official year of the museum’s opening. This seems more likely going by the dates given for donated objects on display in the museum. But many objects go back to private collections that will have had their beginnings much longer ago.
The museum was once funded by Nauru’s phosphate industry but now appears to be entirely government financed, as part of an effort to preserve the tiny nation’s culture and heritage.
It’s classed as the “national museum” of Nauru, but given the small size of the nation and all its money woes, you won’t be surprised to find that it is actually quite small and its exhibition far from a state-of-the-art one. But it nonetheless has plenty of interesting exhibits and I found it quite endearing.
What there is to see: The museum’s exhibition is housed in one single largish hall, but has thematically subdivided sections.
The largest number of original artefacts on display are from WWII, in particular a section of a Japanese “Zero” fighter plane wreck. Apparently there were several such planes left on the island after the war and they remained largely intact into the 1960s. In the meantime they have all been destroyed and have disappeared except for this one fuselage section. Only a small mangled piece of metal remains of a “Betty” bomber that photos show intact and on its wheels as late as 1960. Another plane wreck piece belonged to a USAF bomber that was shot down over Nauru in 1944 by those 127mm twin anti-aircraft guns on Command Ridge (see Nauru).
A series of photos shows not only Command Ridge but also other gun positions and larger metal relics around the island together with their GPS positions. I wish I’d had access to these before coming to Nauru, then I could have tried to locate some of those myself. But mostly these will be in more tricky to access parts of the undergrowth.
Other war-related items include bombs and shells of various sizes, guns, machine-gun ammunition, Japanese swords and uniform parts, communications gear and everyday items such as bottles. Not all parts originate from Nauru, there are also some items from other Pacific islands.
An intriguing item is a black plate of steel with a big hole in it. This was shot through by shells of the German ship “Komet” during its raid on Nauru in 1940. The piece was discarded when Cantilever No. 1 was repaired and it was recovered only as late as in 2020. An elaborate panel explains the German raid in some detail and also has a fake BPC (British Phosphate Company) flag apparently flown by the German ship as a disguise.
Unsurprisingly, the phosphate industry is given a good amount of space in this museum, including a model of the iconic cantilevers and a model phosphate ship. Also on display is a large chunk of phosphate rock together with the product derived from it in both raw and treated from. There’s an elaborate flow chart that explains the phosphate mining and processing industry in more technical detail than a lay person can probably digest.
There’s also a large crude model of the island of Nauru with little plastic houses in red (and white for churches) with labels giving the respective names and/or descriptions. One of the church models had somehow escaped the island and was sitting in the sea.
Of the more contemporary aspects of Nauru’s history the refugee detention camps get only a fleeting mention in passing. Likewise the photo of “Nauru House”, a skyscraper in Melbourne, does not come with any explanatory text about what a financial disaster this was.
Quite intriguing are the large panels with collections of historical photos, going back to the earliest days of colonization by Germany, including the very first map produced for Nauru by the Germans showing the then settlements and no phosphate mining yet.
Dozens of photos show Nauruan people at that time of early colonization. Other collections show early colonial buildings, yet others more contemporary housing. One photo collection is dedicated to the phosphate cantilevers. And it was here that I learned that Cantilever No. 1 gradually collapsed into the corals between 2010 and 2017. Photos from before then show them still upright.
More photo collections are devoted to the Nauru police, to the country’s presidents since independence in 1968, to phosphate ships, to the harbours, the airport and the national airline and one series is about weightlifting. This is Nauru’s national sport and one in which the tiny nation has actually won several medals in international competitions (such as the Commonwealth Games, but not in any Olympics). The most successful Nauruan weightlifter later even became president!
Also covered but of less interest to the dark tourist are traditional dresses, clan symbols and traditional housing before colonization and such things. I mostly skipped those sections.
Just outside the front of the museum are yet more items on open-air display, including a WWII-era plane engine, twin anti-aircraft guns (both painted an unlikely silver), a sea mine and a small locomotive from the days when a narrow-gauge railway line existed for transporting phosphate from the mines to the processing plants. (Hardly anything of that railway is still in situ now).
All in all, I found the museum more informative than I had expected and also full of interesting artefacts. Absolutely not to missed when on Nauru!
Location: in Yaren, on the south coast of Nauru right opposite the airport. This is also the nation’s government district and hence something like the “capital” of the small nation (officially there is no capital).
Google Maps locator: [-0.5451, 166.9148]
Access and costs: If you’ve made it to Nauru, quite easy - and free
Details: The greatest obstacle to seeing this museum is getting to Nauru in the first place. But once you’ve managed that it’s easy to get to the location, especially if you have a hire car (which is recommended anyway). I saw this museum as part of a half-day guided tour with a driver, so I didn’t even have to navigate here myself.
If you’re driving yourself, it’s hard to miss the museum. Just make sure you take the southern road around the airport (the northern road is only open when there’s no plane on the airport apron as the road goes right across it).
Opening times: Monday to Friday 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. … at least nominally. But this being Nauru I wouldn’t rely on it totally.
Admission free.
Time required: I spent about half an hour in this museum, but I skipped a few sections that were of less interest to me. If you want to study absolutely everything there is in detail, you’ll need longer than that, perhaps a full hour or more.
Combinations with other dark destinations: see Nauru.
Combinations with non-dark destinations: see Nauru.
