Starkey graduated in 1921 with a B.S. from Massachusetts Agricultural College (now named the
University of Massachusetts Amherst
The University of Massachusetts Amherst (UMass Amherst, UMass) is a public research university in Amherst, Massachusetts and the sole public land-grant university in Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Founded in 1863 as an agricultural college, it ...
). At
Rutgers University
Rutgers University (; RU), officially Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is a Public university, public land-grant research university consisting of four campuses in New Jersey. Chartered in 1766, Rutgers was originally called Queen's ...
, he graduated in 1923 with an M.S. and in 1924 with a Ph.D. in microbiology. During his graduate school years, he worked from 1922 to 1924 as an assistant at the
New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station
The New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station (or NJAES) is an entity currently operated by Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey in conjunction with the State of New Jersey in the university's role as the state's sole land-grant universit ...
. From 1924 to 1926 he was an instructor in bacteriology at the
University of Minnesota
The University of Minnesota, formally the University of Minnesota, Twin Cities, (UMN Twin Cities, the U of M, or Minnesota) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Minneapolis–Saint Paul, Tw ...
. In the department of microbiology of Rutgers University, he was an assistant professor from 1926 to 1934, an associate professor from 1934 to 1944, and a full professor from 1944 to 1965, when he retired as professor emeritus. From 1954 to 1965 he was the head of the department of agricultural microbiology. At the New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station, he was an associate soil microbiologist from 1926 to 1944 and a research specialist from 1944 to 1965. For the academic year 1937–1938 he was a
Rockefeller Foundation
The Rockefeller Foundation is an American private foundation and philanthropic medical research and arts funding organization based at 420 Fifth Avenue, New York City. The second-oldest major philanthropic institution in America, after the Carneg ...
fellow at the Delft University of Technology.
He did research on bacterial decomposition of organic matter, nitrogen fixation, the role of sulfur, iron, carbon, nitrogen, and other elements in agricultural bacteriology, and industrial fermentation. For a number of years, he was Selman Waksman's deputy at the New Jersey Agricultural Experiment Station.
Starkey was elected in 1930 a Fellow of the
American Association for the Advancement of Science
The American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) is an American international non-profit organization with the stated goals of promoting cooperation among scientists, defending scientific freedom, encouraging scientific respons ...
. From 1941 to 1942 he was the first president of the Theobald Smith Society (the New Jersey branch of the American Society for Microbiology). In 1976 he received the Charles Thom Award from the
Society for Industrial Microbiology and Biotechnology
The Society for Industrial Microbiology and Biotechnology (SIMB) is a nonprofit, international association dedicated to the advancement of microbiological sciences, especially as they apply to industrial products, biotechnology, materials, and proc ...
.
In 1928 he married Florence G. Tenney (1901–1997). In 1928 she received her Ph.D. in microbiology from Rutgers. In the later part of her career, she worked as a researcher on antibiotics at E. R. Squibb & Sons. She coauthored several papers with Selman Waksman.