From his earliest years, Van Allen was fascinated by electricity and the laws of physics. At the age of twelve he and a friend built a high-voltage machine that produced its own " lightning." In high school, his physics teacher regularly chased Van Allen from the laboratory at the end of the day so he could lock up and go home.

As a student at Iowa Wesleyan College and the University of Iowa, Van Allen proved a better scientist than did many professors. He helped develop and check the instrumentation used during Admiral Richard Byrd's (1888-1957) second Antarctic expedition. While testing this equipment, he made cosmic ray measurements, foreshadowing future interest in cosmic rays.

During World War II, Van Allen helped design and build a radio-proximity fuse, a tough assignment because the delicate instrumentation of a radio transmitter and receiver had to withstand the shock of being fired from...