After speaking with Franz Boas and Ruth Benedict in the Anthropology Department at Columbia University, she decided to pursue the field, graduating with a doctorate in 1937.

Her sister Elizabeth was a suffragist, law school graduate and one of the first female bank directors, while her brother Robert was a professor at Harvard and mountaineer.

[1][2] After graduation she went on to travel in Europe and study languages and social sciences at London School of Economics and University of Munich.

[2] The anthropology department head, Franz Boaz provided funds for her to study the Tohono O’odham in Arizona (at the time called Papago Indians).

[1][6] Toward the end of World War I she was employed as a social worker with the American Red Cross, Committee for Crippled and Disabled and was transferred to Civilian Relief to take charge of establishing orphanages in Italy in the summer of 1919.

[5] Graduate school led her to conduct one of the earliest scientific studies of the Tohono O’odham of Arizona, a work that would establish Underhill in the profession.

She later wrote a book titled Autobiography of a Papago Woman, which chronicled the life of Maria Chona, an elderly member of the Tohono O'odham Nation.

[9][4] After graduating from Columbia, Underfill first worked with the U.S. Department of Agriculture Soil Conservation Service and then the Bureau of Indian Affairs.

[6] In this role she traveled extensively and worked with reservation teachers to develop curriculum for Indian Schools that included Native American culture.

[9][full citation needed] Beginning in the 1970s, the Denver Museum of Nature and Science began working with Underhill to capture her own history through audio and video recordings.

[12] On October 28, 1981, she was presented with an award from the Colorado River Indian Tribes for her sincere, devoted and untiring effort in the gathering of information about their culture.

[10] In 1985 The Denver Women's Press Club established a scholarship in Underhill's honor; this award is given to a University of Colorado student for accomplishment in creative writing.