When Svend Escal Thorp was born on 6 December 1913, in Enumclaw, King, Washington, United States, his father, Martin J. Thorp, was 33 and his mother, Karen Marie Charlotte Betty Christensen, was 38. He married Anne Natheel Morris on 12 June 1939, in City and Borough of Juneau, Alaska, United States. They were the parents of at least 1 son and 1 daughter. He lived in Osceola, King, Washington, United States in 1920. He died in February 1972, in Fairbanks, Fairbanks North Star Borough, Alaska, United States, at the age of 58.