His parents returned to their home state of West Virginia for the birth of his younger sister Pearl S. Buck.
He enrolled at Fredericksburg College and later Washington and Lee University, where he was elected to Phi Beta Kappa.
[1] Sydenstricker joined the United States Public Health Service in 1915 to work with Benjamin S. Warren.
Together, they researched the health and economic status of textile factory workers in New York City, as well as sickness insurance in Europe.
Sydenstricker was named head of the Office of Statistical Investigations in 1920, and began the Hagerstown Morbidity Survey the next year.