The founder of Antalieptė Ethnographic Museum is Algimantas Žilėnas. The museum was established in modest premises of Antalieptė secondary school. The area of the room, where the valuables were started to be collected, was only 18 square meters. The museum was led by history teachers for a very modest salary. Jonas Vitkauskas was the teacher who led the museum longest.
In 1976, after liquidation of Antalieptė agricultural technical school, an opportunity arose to extend the premises of museum. In 2003 August, after the summer holidays, it was found out that the museum was robbed. Villains, who destroyed the museum, were not found. The remaining items were stacked in the garage, and the museum has ceased to exist.
Under pressure of the local ethnographers, especially Vytautas Indrašius, the school leaders and history teachers got concerned about resuscitation of the museum. In 2006 the classroom of Lithuanian language received the former exhibits of the museum. In 2012 the Antalieptė school was closed.
In 2012 the exhibits were transferred to Antalieptė multifunctional center. Now over 300 exhibits are available. They are all carefully inventoried, systematized. Currently the museum is supervised by the teacher Vincas Kibirkštis. Elderate workers Aušra Kastanauskienė and Audrutė Saulienė kindly help him. In the opening hours they open the museum for visitors and tell the visitors about the museum objects.