Ramsey's parents hoped that he would go to West Point, but at 15, he was too young to be admitted. He was awarded a scholarship to Kansas University, but in 1930 his father was posted to Governors Island, New York. Ramsey therefore entered Columbia University in 1931, and began studying engineering. He became interested in mathematics, and switched to this as his academic major. By the time he received his B.A. from Columbia in 1935, he had become interested in physics. Columbia awarded him a Kellett Fellowship to Cambridge University where he studied physics at Cavendish Laboratory under Lord Rutherford and Maurice Goldhaber, and encountered notable physicists including Edward Appleton, Max Born, Edward Bullard, James Chadwick, John Cockcroft, Paul Dirac, Arthur Eddington, Ralph Fowler, Mark Oliphant and J.J. Thomson. At Cambridge, he took the tripos in order to study quantum mechanics, which had not been covered at Columbia, resulting in being awarded a second B.A. degree by Cambridge.