Jacobi joined the editorial staff of "The Minnesota Quarterly", and after graduation in 1931, he became a news reporter, reviewer and sub-editor for the "Minneapolis Star", as well as a frequent reviewer of books and plays. He also served on the staff of the "Minnesota Ski-U-Mah", a campus humor magazine (described on the jackets of Jacobi's books as 'a scholastic publication'). After a while regular hours palled, and he left the "Star", renting an office in uptown Minneapolis in which were typewriter, paper, a few reference books, and a list of editorial addresses in New York.