The herbarium is staffed by the South African National Biodiversity Institute and has material dating back to 1812, collected by William John Burchell, and a collection of 240 specimens donated by Constance Georgina Adams in 1919,[3] as well as geological material gathered by Andrew Geddes Bain and W. G. Atherstone.

It also houses a large collection of invertebrate, vertebrate and tetrapod fossils (some of which are from the world renowned Waterloo Farm lagerstätte), and palaeolithic stone tools discovered by Thomas Holden Bowker (1808–1885) near the Great Fish River.

Then a small stipend was offered and the position was taken by Mary Glanville until 1888 when S. Mundy, a temporary curator took over and was replaced by Selmar Schonland in 1889.

Schonland filled the post until 1910 and handed the reins to John Hewitt who managed the museum for an extraordinarily long term from 1910 to 1958.

He was succeeded by T. H. Barry, appointed Director of the South African Museum in Cape Town in 1964 and was in turn followed in 1965 by the entomologist Charles Jacot-Guillarmod (the husband of Amy Jacot Guillarmod), until 1977.