 He was educated at Monongalia Academy, West Virginia Agricultural College, and West Virginia University (A.B., 1883; Ph.D., 1894).He was employed at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History as an assistant (1886–1894), as assistant curator of ethnology (1896–1910), and as curator from 1910 until his death in 1935.Though Hough's work revolved around cataloging the museum's collections, he also spent time doing archaeological field work in the American Southwest.