Altai State History Museum - the oldest museum in Siberia. It is located in the historic center of Barnaul, in the building which is a historical and cultural monument of architecture of the middle of XIX century. The museum building was built in 1851 and originally was used as a main chemical laboratory of the Altai region.

Local History Museum was founded in 1823 and is considered the legal successor of Barnaul Mining Museum, founded in the same year for the 100th anniversary of the mining business in the Altai. The initiator of the foundation of the Altai State Local History Museum gave PK Frolov and Frederick August von Gebler. Visitors to the museum exhibits were collected from the beginning of the XVIII century. It was the ethnographic material of North American and Siberian models of mining machines as well as herbarium and rich at that time mountain library.

The first half of the XIX century, the museum has become famous as a research institution, and therefore, it was closed to the public. By the end of XIX century scientific value of the Museum of Local History weakened. In 1913, Nicholas II issued a decree on the transfer of the new building of the museum on the street Polzunova. Reconstruction of objects involved architect NI Feodosievich.

By the end of 1918 the museum's collection includes a collection of insects, soil, minerals, stuffed birds and various animals, the herbarium of local flora and a huge amount of photos. In 1920, the museum opened to the public.

Today the museum collection includes more than 150 thousand exhibits, including here kept the world's only model steam engine invented in 1763 I.Polzunovym. This curiosity is exhibited 1825

Particular interest to visitors are the archaeological finds, that tell the history of the ancient Altai, various household items, as well as the numismatic, historical, technical and mineralogical collection.