[3][4] During his time at the University of Kansas, Hodge was elected to the Phi Beta Kappa scholastic society and the Pi Mu Epsilon honorary mathematics organization.
[4] Alongside his studies for a Master's, Hodge taught at Western University, Quindaro and worked as a chemist in the Kansas Department of Inspections.
[3] From 1941 he worked at the recently opened USDA Northern Regional Research Center in Peoria, Illinois until his retirement in 1980.
[3] Through this work he became interested in the Maillard reaction, a process where sugars react with amino acids.
This reaction is involved in the browning of food during cooking but also the loss of sugar during glucose production from corn wet-milling.
In addition, along with collaborator Friedrick Weygand of the University of Munich, he investigated the formation of reductones.