The museum opened in April 1999 in a two-story building at the Ike Skelton Training Site.[2] However, after 13 years the collection had become to large to display in the 1,000 sq ft (93 m2) space and the museum announced plans to move.[3] It began relocating to a series of 6,400 sq ft (590 m2) maintenance bays adjacent to the Missouri National Guard headquarters in 2013.[4] The museum held a grand opening in the new space on 7 December 2014.[5]
In the following years the museum received several aircraft for display, including an F-4 in August 2015 and a C-130 from the closed Octave Chanute Aerospace Museum in May 2016.[6][7] The latter was repainted in European camouflage in July 2017.[8]
Exhibits
Temporary exhibits at the museum have covered subjects such as African-Americans in the military, military food and military toys.[9][10][11]
The museum holds a Veterans Appreciation Weekend twice annually around Memorial Day and Veterans Day, with reenactors and recreations of military life.[19]
