Pike was born in Oklahoma City on February 14, 1913 to James A. Pike and Pearl Agatha Wimsatt Pike. His father died when he was two, and he moved to California with his mother, who married California attorney Claude McFadden. Pike, who was Roman Catholic, graduated from Hollywood High School in 1930 and considered entering the priesthood; however, in the two years he attended Santa Clara University, a private Jesuit school, he came to consider himself an agnostic. Pike transferred to the University of California at Los Angeles (UCLA) for a year, then transferred again to the University of Southern California (USC), where he received his BA in 1934 and an LL.B. from the university's law school in 1936. That same year he was admitted to the California bar.