In 1951, Ken graduated from Kenwood High School and matriculated to Washington College in Chestertown on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. There, he played lacrosse, joined the Phi Sigma Kappa fraternity, and become involved in student government. He spent the first semester of his senior year at American University in Washington, DC to study the federal government. In 1955 he graduated with a BA in political science with a concentration in international political communication.

War had had a pervasive influence on Ken’s life. His family had received their farm in Templeton as payment for his great-grandfather’s military service during the US Civil War. Ken left Templeton when his father was offered an engineering job as part of WWII’s new war economy. Ken’s older brother Bob served in the Korean War while Ken was at Washington College. Concerns regarding war and diplomacy later informed some of the kinds of work Ken pursued.

Upon completing college, Ken considered two career possibilities. The first was to work as a librarian overseas as part of the United States Information Agency (USIA). This combined Ken’s admiration for his mother’s work as a librarian with his interest in propaganda. The focus, as he put it, would have been on advocating “this is what Americans do and this is why they do it”  in the hopes of diminishing the threat of war.

While at Washington College, Ken had also pursued training that qualified him for his second career possibility – a public school teacher. He knew that if he enlisted in the military, he would be guaranteed a public teaching position upon his return and that his years of military service would count toward his seniority in the public school system.

Following graduation, Ken began teaching at North Point Junior High in Dundalk, Maryland. During the 1955-56 school year, he also tried to enlist in the Army alongside his friend Walt Ruth, but was turned down based on the results of his physical exam.