Gordon Charles Danielson was born in Dover, Idaho in 1912 to Norwegian immigrants, Gustov and Olga (Olson) Danielson. His father worked as a yard foreman and superintendent of lumber mills and moved the family to Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada in 1925. Gordon graduated as valedictorian from the King George V High School in Ladner, British Columbia in 1928. He received his B.A. (1933) and M.A. (1935) in physics from the University of British Columbia and his Ph.D. (1940) in physics from Purdue University. He spent small amounts of time working for U.S. Rubber in Detroit, Michigan (1940), on the physics faculty at the University of Idaho (1941), at the Radiation Lab at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (1942-1946), and at Bell Telephone Labs (1946-1948).



Danielson came to Iowa State College (University) as an Associate Professor of Physics in 1948. He received promotions to Professor of Physics in 1953 and Distinguished Professor in Sciences and Humanities in 1964, a position he held until his retirement and transition to Emeritus Professor in 1981. For much of that time, he also served as Senior Physicist at Ames Laboratory.



He married Dorothy Thompson in 1939 with whom he had four children, a daughter and three sons. He died on September 30, 1983.