The M. D. Anderson Cancer Center is named after Monroe Dunaway Anderson, a banker and cotton trader from Jackson, Tennessee. He was a member of a business partnership with Will Clayton that, in the event of one of their deaths, would require a large amount of money lost to estate tax. In order to avoid this Anderson created the M. D. Anderson Foundation with an initial sum of $300,000. In 1939 after Anderson's death the foundation received $19 million.

In 1941 the Texas Legislature had appropriated $500,000 to build a cancer hospital and research center. The Anderson Foundation agreed to match funds with the state if the hospital were located in Houston in the Texas Medical Center (another project of the Anderson Foundation), and named after Anderson.

Using surplus World War II Army barracks, the hospital operated for 10 years from a converted residence and 46 beds leased in a Houston hospital before moving to its current location in 1954.

Source: Donna Hampton at Find-A-Grave