Educated with his younger brother (Lewis Jr.) in the city schools (including the new "central" high school in the basement of the German Lutheran Church on Walnut below Ninth), Godfrey finished at the top of his class. Storer offered to pay for the boy's college tuition, but then with the help of publisher Heinrich Roedter contacted congressman David Tiernan Disney and managed to secure an appointment to the United States Military Academy, although the process started when Godfrey was just 14 (the minimum entrance age was 16) and the tall youth arrived in West Point, New York months after his 15th birthday.