For over seventy years, the AMEDD Museum looked for a permanent home. Originally established in 1921 at Carlisle Barracks, Pennsylvania, it moved to an unfinished basement at Fort Sam Houston in 1946. Artifacts were stored all over the United States unavailable for use.
In 1978, a group of retired Army Medical Department personnel, military and civilian, joined to form the Army Medical Department Museum Foundation, Inc. The Army Medical Department Museum Foundation was incorporated in the state of Texas in 1978 as a non-profit with the purpose of raising funds to construct a medical museum at Fort Sam Houston, Texas that would preserve over 200 years of a highly significant aspect of our nation’s history.