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Theodore Milton Wassmer was born on 23 February 1910 to Hester Hall and Theodore James Wassmer in Salt Lake City, Utah. He was the first of eight children to be born to the family.

Wassmer's interest in painting did not begin until 1927 at age 17, when he was given his first set of oil paints. Up to that time, he had never been exposed to oil painting or artists. By selling his artwork, he saved enough money to go to the Chicago World's Fair of 1934, where he was greatly impressed by displays of Old Masters and Impressionists. For the next five years, Wassmer worked days in a hardware store, while studying landscape and mural painting at night, and on weekends with mural painter Florence E. Ware. He also worked as a model and background painter for Ms. Ware, who painted the University of Utah's Kingsbury Hall murals under a WPA project grant, which was headed in Utah at the time by his future wife Judy Farnsworth Lund. In 1939 Wassmer rented the top floor apartment of a brownstone house on the corner of 2nd Avenue and "E" Street, referring to it as his penthouse studio. During the very productive 2 1/2 years he stayed there, he held one-man art shows, and received many prominent visitors in the art and music world.

A talent scout from Paramount Studios approached him in 1941. A screen test was arranged in Hollywood, which resulted in the offer of a contract. Unfortunately, Wassmer never had to make the decision between art and films, as it was made for him by the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor. In January 1942 Wassmer enlisted in the Air Force, and spent three years at Sheppard Field in Wichita Falls, Texas. In his off duty hours, he painted large murals in the recreation building. Due to a freak accident in July 1944, Wassmer's right arm, which was his painting arm, was paralyzed. He was sent to Bushnell General Hospital in Brigham City for treatment. He began painting with his left arm, and created a large mural for the hospital wall. He was discharged from the Air Force in October 1945 as a sergeant, but only had 10% use of his right arm.

Wassmer married Judy Farnsworth Lund in December 1945 in New York City. They left for Cape Cod where they spent the summer painting. The two studied painting at the Art Student's League in New York City and Woodstock. After focusing on learning portrait painting, he opened a studio in the Carnegie Hall tower in New York City. He spent two years painting portraits, but decided it wasn't for him. He turned his study to Cezanne, impressionistic and post impressionistic painting, observing and copying from originals. To further their art education, Wassmer and Lund made two trips to Europe to study the museums of Spain and Italy. The couple purchased an old stone house in the rural setting of Bearsville, New York, in 1952. They made painting studios out of two garages. Here they continued to live for the next 30 years, where she worked on portraits, and he worked on exhibiting across the country. Many of his paintings are centered on dance and theater. He was never able to paint large canvasses again due to his injuries. The stone house was sold in 1985, and the couple returned to Salt Lake City. From their personal art collection of American and European painters, they donated over 700 works to the Springville Museum of Art in Springville, Utah, to Snow College in Ephraim, Utah, and to the Brigham City Museum. These collected paintings are known as the Lund-Wassmer Collections. In 1990, the Springville Museum of Art held a 60 year retrospective show (1930-1990) of 100 of Wassmer's works from around the country. There are in existence over 2000 paintings by Ted Wassmer that are in private collections, or in museums at colleges or schools around the United States and Europe.