Ida was born in Canton, Ohio, the elder daughter of James Saxton, a prominent Canton banker, and Katherine DeWalt. In 1855, her father founded Saxton, PA. Her grandfather, John Saxton, in 1815 founded The Repository, the city's first and now only newspaper. A graduate of Brook Hall Seminary, a finishing school in Media, Pennsylvania, Ida was refined, charming, and strikingly attractive when she met William "Bill" McKinley at a picnic in 1867. They did not begin courting until after she returned from a Grand Tour of Europe in 1869. While single, she worked for a time as a cashier in her father's bank, a position then usually reserved for men.
