After graduating from Cornell University and serving a brief stint in the U.S. Army, Oakley Ray became a full-time student at the University of Pittsburgh, training to be a clinical psychologist. He completed his clinical training and moved to animal research even before he received his Ph.D. Working in the behavioral research laboratory of Larry Stein, he learned all the techniques and technologies of brain stimulation and biochemistry relevant to the expanding field of neuropsychopharmacology. Steins laboratory was part of a multidisciplinary research facility so Oakley Ray learned brain anatomy, surgery, biochemistry, and pharmacology. When Larry Stein moved on, Oakley Ray took over the lab, expanded it, and established it as an independent research laboratory. He continued working in Pittsburgh as an Associate Professor at the University of Pittsburgh and at Chatham College while still directing the research laboratory in the Veterans Administration Hospital at Leech Farm Road in Pittsburgh. Following his move to Nashville to be Professor in Psychology and Pharmacology, and later in Psychiatry, as well as the Chief of the Psychology Program at the Nashville Veterans Administration Hospital, he became more involved in human psychopharmacology. He later served as the Executive Secretary of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology and the International College of Neuropsychopharmacology.