It has been said that great collections make great museums. In reality, there are many factors that go into creating a great museum, but among a community's civic institutions, the collecting, preservation and documentation of that community's material heritage set museums apart from all the rest.
Collecting of local history artifacts in Waterloo Region predates the opening of Doon Pioneer Village, now known as the Doon Heritage Village. The Waterloo Historical Society began collecting in 1912, donating their collection to the museum in 1960.
When the Waterloo Historical Society was founded, then president W.H. Breithaupt and Secretary H. W. Brown stated that "it is the ambition of the Society to acquire at an early date, a substantial fireproof county building in which to preserve permanently all such records and general objects of historic interest".
Since 1912, the collection of artifacts (many collected by the Waterloo Historical Society) and buildings ( which has come to be known as Doon Heritage Village) the Waterloo Region Museum has grown into one of the largest community museum collections in Ontario.