In 1960, he earned his Doctor of Philosophy from the University of Pennsylvania, where he studied the history, art and archeology of the ancient Middle East and the cuneiform scripts of the Sumerian, Akkadian and Hurrian languages. The title of his Doctor of Philosophy dissertation was Mesopotamian and Related Female Figurines: Their Chronology, Diffusion and Cultural Functions.
He was considered a leading expert on Indus valley peoples and their languages. He received his bachelor"s degree in classical studies in 1953 from the University of Akron. Dales served in the Marine Corps in China from 1945-1948.
He spent 30 seasons of archeological excavations, starting at Nippur in 1957.
Later, he excavated a number of the Indus Valley Civilization sites. In 1959, he conducted an archeological survey in the Bandar Abbas region of southern Iran.
In 1964-1965, he excavated at Mohenjo Daro for one season. Between 1973 and 1979, Dales excavated at the Indus Valley Civilization site of Balakot.
From 1961-1963 he was a special lecturer at the University of Toronto, Canada.
At the University of California, Berkeley
A year later this appointment was adjusted to a half-time appointment in the Department of Near Eastern Studies and a half-time appointment in the Department of South and Southeast Asian Studies. From April 1979 through December 1980, he chaired the Department of South and Southeast Asian Studies. He was also the Chairman of Berkeley"s Center for South and Southeast Asian Studies from 1980-1982.
Harappa Archeological Research Project
In 1986, he became one of the co-directors of the Harappa Archeological Research Project, involving a number of universities and institutions.
He died in 1992 at Berkeley.
In 1972, Dales joined the faculty of the University of California, Berkeley as a member of the Department of Near Eastern Studies.