Research centers have become a key component of the research infrastructure in schools of social work, including the George Warren Brown School of Social Work at Washington University. In 1993, that school's Center for Mental Health Services Research (CMHSR) received funding from the National Institute of Mental Health (NIMH) as a Social Work Research Development Center (R24 MH50857), with a renewal in 1999 for five more years of support. After the program announcement for the social work research development center mechanism expired, the center applied under an "advanced" mechanism and in 2004 was awarded five years of funding as an NIMH Advanced Center for Interventions and Services Research (P30 MH068579). This article describes the background for developing the center, the center's aims and research agenda, its structure and functioning, and outcomes of CMHSR from 1993 to the present.