The Aerospace Medical Association (AsMA) was founded in 1929 by Louis H. Bauer, M.D., the first medical director of the Aeronautics Branch of the Department of Commerce (which later became the FAA).

The Association was founded to share information on aeronautical medicine with the american public and aircrew to generate further progress in the field, with annual meetings held, first national growing to international by the 1940s, and the production of a quarterly journal from March 1930.

In 1942, the society first started appointing fellows to the society and in 1944 created an award for achievement in the field

In 1950, the Space Medicine Branch of the AsMA society was formed, following the U.S. Air Force School of Aviation Medicine establishing a Department of Space Medicine the previous year.

In November 1960 the association’s executive council permitted a group of American Air Force flight surgeons to form a constituent organization called the Society of U.S. Air Force Flight Surgeons. The organization continues to the present day and serves as a forum for men and women in the career field to socialize and discuss key issues. In the mid-1970s the U.S. Navy formed a similar constituent organization.

Through the decades the organization has expanded to include researchers, physiologists, nurses, and many other aerospace medicine professionals.