Linus Pauling begins this interview by describing his early interest in science. While growing up in Portland, Oregon, he collected laboratory equipment and carried out chemistry experiments in his home. He also worked in the chemistry laboratory of his high school. Pauling supported himself through his undergraduate years at Oregon State Agricultural College by working in the Chemistry department stockroom and assisting an engineering professor. During graduate school at Caltech, he learned x-ray crystallography from Roscoe Dickinson and published his first paper. Pauling continued to use crystallography to attack his more complex chemical problems. In 1926, Pauling was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship to study in Europe. In Z rich, he carried out research on the interaction of two helium atoms which later led him to develop the theory of the three-electron bond. Pauling concludes this interview with his return to Caltech as assistant professor of chemistry.