Yeovil Junction Station opened in 1860, on the newly constructed Salisbury to Exeter line, operated by the London & South Western Railway.  It became a busy and important junction, particularly in respect of goods which were transferred between the LSWR and the Great Western at Yeovil.  To further facilitate goods transfer at Yeovil Junction, the Clifton Maybank branch was constructed which directly linked the GWR's Weymouth line to the LWSR's Yeovil Junction station.  By the early 1900s some 1,500 goods wagons were exchanged at Yeovil each month, as well as 260 tons of general goods which were moved between wagons in the transfer shed.

However, with more goods being carried by road from the beginning of the 1930s, falling railway goods volumes resulted in the Clifton Maybank branch being closed down in 1937.  Nevertheless, Yeovil Junction remained an important centre for steam locomotives on the Waterloo to Exeter line, and in 1947 a new 70 foot turntable was installed for turning the newly introduced Bullied Pacifics.  However, the transfer shed went out of use in 1952, and became a store, then an engineering unit for private companies.

The above-mentioned turntable became central to the formation of a railway centre at Yeovil.  The turntable remained in place right through to the late 1980s, despite steam locos having been withdrawn from BR service 20 years earlier.  To preserve the turntable and to provide facilities for main line steam specials, The South West Main Line Steam Company was formed in 1993.  The organisation secured a 99-year lease on the turntable and the Clifton Maybank branch trackbed; the latter having been neglected since 1937.  It is that company, with its charitable status, that runs the Yeovil Railway Centre.

Part of the branch line now provides a short demonstration line, on which the public can take rides in an ex-GWR brake van, pulled by the resident steam saddle tank loco "Pectin".  That transfer shed is now a public area, part museum, part cafeteria and part art gallery.  The island platform at the centre also has the book and souvenir shop, as well as offices for the organisation.