The elastic behavior of thin circular cylindrical shells supported along both edges subjected to the radiant heating from one direction is dealt experimentally and theoretically. The temperature.rise, the displacements and the strains at many points on the surfaces are measured and discussed.The measured temperaturerise distributions are employed in the calculation based on the MIZOGUCHI's theory for thin circular cylindrical shells. It is found that the theoretically predicted behavior agrees reasonably well with the behavior obtained by the experiment.