Ruben Elbert Caudill was born in Ashe County, North Carolina, on August 1, 1869. Caudill lived in North Wilkesboro (Wilkes County) from around 1900 to 1922, where he worked as a salesman, an inspector at a lumber yard, and a manager of a creamery. By 1930, he had moved back to West Jefferson (Ashe County) and became a Baptist minister. He later moved to Marion, Virginia, where he died on August 7, 1945.