Tina Engdahl Bangs was born December 31, 1915 in Spokane, Washington and died in Houston on September 21, 1999. John Leslie “Jack” Bangs was born September 3, 1913 in Minot, North Dakota and died May 2, 1971. Jack served in the Navy during World War II; they are both buried in the Houston National Cemetery. They were recruited to Houston in 1951 to open a speech and hearing clinic in space donated by Methodist Hospital. The new building for the Houston Speech and Hearing Center Clinical Services opened in 1959 and was tripled in size in 1969 by the addition of a research building.

The University of Texas Speech and Hearing Institute was founded in 1951 as the Houston Speech and Hearing Clinic. It joined the UT system in 1971 and for a year was the Division of Communicative Disorders of the University of Texas Graduate School of Biomedical Sciences at Houston. In October 1972 it was renamed the University of Texas Speech and Hearing Institute at Houston and became part of the UT Health Science Center at Houston. Struggling with reduced state funding, fewer resources for faculty and research, and diminished demand for educational programs, its services were taken over by the United Way of the Texas Gulf Coast and the Institute closed on October 31, 1992.