When Isaac James Palmer was born on 3 October 1873, in Bloomington, Bear Lake, Idaho Territory, United States, his father, Isaac Hodgkinson Palmer, was 24 and his mother, Alice Elizabeth Holmes, was 19. He married Eliza Jane Curtis on 10 July 1895, in Graham, Arizona Territory, United States. They were the parents of at least 3 sons and 4 daughters. He lived in Safford, Graham, Arizona Territory, United States in 1900 and World in 1921. He died on 6 October 1945, in Thatcher, Graham, Arizona, United States, at the age of 72, and was buried in Thatcher Cemetery, Thatcher, Graham, Arizona, United States.