[1] Schairer studied chemistry at Yale University with a bachelor's degree in 1925 and a doctorate in 1928.
He was the president and one of the organizers of the undergraduate club "Yale Mineralogical Society" in 1923.
From 1927, he was a chemist at the Carnegie Institution Geophysical Laboratory in Washington, D.C. where he remained on the staff until mandatory retirement in 1969, when he became a part-time employee.
During World War II, the lab worked on military research (erosion in cannon and machine gun barrels).
From the 1950s Schairer worked with Hatten Schuyler Yoder and Cecil Edgar Tilley on basalt fusions.