Of major interest to those concernedwith early mnemonic process and function is the question of whether early memories likelyencoded without the benefit of language later are accessible to verbal report. In the context of acontrolled laboratory study, we examined this question in children who were 16 and 20 monthsat the time of exposure to specific target events and who subsequently were tested for theirmemories of the events after a delay of either 6 or 12 months (at 22–32 months) and thenagain at 3 years. At the first delayed-recall test, children evidenced memory both nonverbally andverbally. Nonverbal mnemonic expression was related to age at the time of test; verbalmnemonic expression was related to verbal fluency at the time of test. At the seconddelayed-recall test, children evidenced continued accessibility of their early memories. Verbalmnemonic expression was related to previous mnemonic expression, both nonverbal and verbal,each of which contributed unique variance. The relevance of these findings on memory forcontrolled laboratory events for issues of memory for traumatic experiences is discussed.