Born in Ypsilanti, Michigan, Carl McIntire was the oldest of four children born to Charles Curtis McIntire, a Presbyterian minister and M.A. graduate of Princeton University, and Hettie Hotchkin McIntire. McIntire's father pastored in Salt Lake City, but by 1912 he had suffered a mental breakdown and was hospitalized. He and his wife were divorced, and she raised the children alone in Durant, Oklahoma, where she served as Dean of Women at Southeastern State Teachers College (now Southeastern Oklahoma State University). Carl McIntire completed high school in Durant and attended Southeastern State, where he became an award-winning intercollegiate debater and president of the student body during his final year. For his senior year, he transferred to Park College, Parkville, Missouri, where he received his B.A. degree before entering Princeton Theological Seminary, New Jersey, in 1928 to prepare for the Presbyterian ministry. Meanwhile, he worked as a janitor and sold maps to farmers door-to-door in Caddo County, Oklahoma.