When Raymond Elisha Kinney was born on 17 July 1909, in Ravenna, Buffalo, Nebraska, United States, his father, Alva Raymond Kinney, was 38 and his mother, Grace Catherine Baragar, was 35. He married Elizabeth Swartz on 6 June 1934, in Loomis, Phelps, Nebraska, United States. He lived in China in 1935 and Manhattan, New York City, New York, United States in 1940. He died on 14 December 1969, in Orange, California, United States, at the age of 60.