Isaac Edson Archibald was born to Isaac Archibald and Mary (Horton) Archibald on September 22, 1861 in Guysborough, Nova Scotia.
Archibald married Hattie May (Sawyer) Garland (1865-?) on January 30,1895 in Bangor, Maine. Hattie was the daughter of William and Harriet Sawyer.
Archibald was a fisherman and Captain, and was a Steamboat entrepreneur based in Rockland, Maine. He had a lumber business in Thomaston, Maine and had his own marine railway at Rockland by 1913.