On April 9, 1984, a special package from Bethesda arrived at Building 560 on the Frederick Cancer Research Facility (FCRF) campus. In an unusual move, it came not by courier but by scientist, who carried it directly to a biosafety level 3 (BSL-3) laboratory, at the time one of FCRF’s few facilities for working with highly dangerous biological entities. Exposure to the box’s contents meant likelihood of a protracted death. Julian Bess Jr. remembers when Larry Arthur, Ph.D., brought that box containing two sealed flasks of HIV-infected cells into their laboratory.

In spring 1976, Building 472 at Frederick Cancer Research Center (FCRC) buzzed with activity as crews delivered and installed scientific equipment. Girded by steam pipes and bounded on one side by a narrow, one-lane road, the hulking brick structure had been among those vacated when the biowarfare program at Fort Detrick—its previous occupant—shut down. But its new life was about to begin.

The bureaucracy of Fort Detrick had transitioned from death to life. So said the Washington Post in October 1971, when President Richard M. Nixon converted the Army base’s old biowarfare laboratories into a center for life-saving cancer research. Many observers agreed it was an ambitious, hopeful vision. But what they didn’t know is that representatives from the Department of Defense and the Department of Health, Education, and Welfare (HEW) had been working on the transition for months.

NCI has produced a new documentary-style video marking 10 years since it gave the Frederick National Laboratory for Cancer Research its current name.

The Biological Response Modifiers Program (BRMP) in Frederick had visitors. A group of well-regarded scientific experts arrived in 1991 to tour some of its laboratories and spaces. Learning about the program was only part of their goal, however. They were there to evaluate it.