Theodore Spencer Case was born on January 26, 1832, in Jackson, Butts County, Georgia.

He was a physician and a Civil war Union Army officer. In 1856, he graduated from the Starling Medical College, Columbus, Ohio. In 1883, he received the honorary degree of Ph.D. from the University of Kansas and he settled in Kansas City. He worked as an editor of the Medical Review (1860-1861) and held the office of an alderman (1860). In 1861, he became 2nd lieutenant of the 25th Missouri Infantry and later captain and assistant quartermaster. In 1865, he was made colonel and quartermaster general. He also worked as curator of the University of Missouri, postmaster of Kansas City (1873-1885), and in 1885, he became professor of chemistry at Kansas City Medical College. He edited the Kansas City Review of Science and Industry (1877-1885) and in 1886, he became president of the Kansas City Real Estate and Stock Exchange.

In 1858, he married Julia McCoy Lykins (1839–1872) and in 1872, he remarried Fidelia Olivia Wright (1845–1908). He died on February 16, 1900, in Kansas City, Missouri.