Early interest in physics in South Dakota; early training as a physicist at University of Minnesota, early 1920s; acceleration of positive ions and electrons; instructor at Princeton University, 1923; doctoral work at Johns Hopkins University, 1924-1926; pulse radio and ionosphere experiments, 1925; work on high voltages with Tesla coils for proton acceleration, Department of Terrestrial Magnetism, 1926-1931; obtaining funds for research, effect of Depression; building Van de Graaff machine, 1932; connections between theorists and experimentalists in Washington-Baltimore region, 1925-1930s; disintegration of light elements, 1932; reaction to discovery of neutron, 1932; experimental work on proton-proton and proton-neutron forces, 1934-1936; organization of Washington conferences on theoretical physics, collaboration between Carnegie Institution and George Washington University, 1930s; early fission experiments. Also prominently mentioned are: Edoardo Amaldi, Joseph Sweetman Ames, Niels Henrik David Bohr, Gregory Breit, Enrico Fermi, John Fleming, Lawrence Randolph Hafstad, Ernest Orlando Lawrence, Ernest Rutherford, John Torrence Tate, Robert Jamison Van de Graaff; Carnegie Institution of Washington Dept. of Terrestrial Magnetism, Conference on Theoretical Physics (Washington, D.C.), General Electric Co., Princeton University, and United States National Bureau of Standards.