The Moses Foundation (Stiftung Moses) was started on January 20, 1999. Horst August and Claudia Moses, a married couple from Mainz who lived close to the Gutenberg Museum, decided to bequeath their estate to a charitable cause. In keeping with the objectives of the International Gutenberg Society they chose to channel their liquid assets and income from rents on several properties into a foundation whose chief purpose is:

"to promote research into the history of printing and of the book and to give both moral and financial support to the Gutenberg Museum in Mainz ".

Although the early days of the foundation were dominated by the restoration of the buildings it had taken over, right from the start many research measures were quickly implemented and several acquisitions made with foundation funds.

Since its launch in 1999 the foundation has raised DM 392,666 or EUR 200,763 to date. The following activities have already been or are in the process of being made possible:

1. Individual cataloguing of and research into the incunabula stored in Mainz, i.e. books printed before 1500. This project will run continuously over the next few years.

2. Integration of Mainz's pre-1840/50 type specimens in the museum collections. Type specimens were advertising produced by type foundries wishing to promote and popularise their typefaces.

The following were given prior consideration when making acquisitions for the Gutenberg Museum: objects pertinent to the history of printing in Eastern Asia and the art of binding and historic literature on the history of printing in Europe. The Eastern Asian section, for example, was able to procure a complete set of moveable wooden Chinese type from the late 18th century, a great rarity indeed. The foundation has also proved extremely helpful – often at short notice – when special acquisitions were to be made which lay beyond the bounds of the normal museum budget. Many different artefacts have since been bought which now feature in the museum's permanent display, helping to create a vivid documentation of the history of type and script. These items include an early wooden portable typewriter, to name but one.

The foundation is currently sponsoring the Bilderlust und Lesefrüchte catalogue which accompanies the exhibition of the same name at the museum.