Ralph Ginzburg was born in Brooklyn on October 28, 1929, to Russian-Jewish immigrant parents. He went to New Utrecht High School in Brooklyn and was president of his class. Since his parents hoped that he could be an accountant, when he first enrolled in City College of New York after high school, he majored in accounting. While Ginzburg was taking a journalism class at CCNY, his professor, Irving Rosenthal, realised his talent in journalism and encouraged him to accept an editorial job on the school newspaper, "The Ticker". Ginzburg later became editor-in-chief of it, which further fostered his passion for journalism.