Robert Bruce Inverarity was born in Seattle, Washington in 1909. He was the son of theater manager Duncan George Inverarity and Anna Petersen Inverarity. Throughout his life Inverarity was involved in a broad range of art and anthropology-related activities as a museum administrator, scholar, artist and photographer. He was an authority on Pacific Northwest Indian Art.

A large part of Inverarity's childhood was spent in Calgary, Canada, where his father managed a theater, but the family moved back to Seattle during his teenage years. As a young man, Inverarity shared a studio with Mark Tobey and studied with him for a time. He taught art at Cornish School of the Arts in Seattle, and directed the School of Creative Art in Vancouver, Canada. During this time, he continued to study Northwest Coast Indian cultures and arts. In 1933, Inverarity became an instructor of puppetry, a life-long interest of his, at the University of Washington Drama School. In 1936, the Federal Art Project of the Works Progress Administration hired Inverarity as State Director. In 1939, he moved from the Federal Art Project to the Art and Crafts Project, which he also directed. In 1941, he published Movable Masks and Figures of the North Pacific Coast Indians . During World War II, Inverarity served as Chief of Design for Camouflage for the U.S. Navy (1941-1943) and then as an Official Navy War Artist (1943-1945).

Inverarity earned his Bachelor of Arts degree in art and anthropology from the University of Washington in 1946, and then earned his Master's degree and Ph.D. in fine arts from Fremont University in Los Angeles, where he studied with Hilaire Hiler, the artist, psychologist and color theoretician. Inverarity's career as a museum director began in 1949 when he became the founding director of the Museum of International Folk Art in Santa Fe, New Mexico. His book, Art of the Northwest Coast Indians , was published in 1950 while he was still in New Mexico. In 1954, Inverarity's dismissal from the Museum of International Folk Art caused much controversy in New Mexico and in the museum world in general. Many staff members of the museum resigned in solidarity. In 1954, the Adirondack Museum in Blue Mountain Lake, New York hired Inverarity as its first director. He stayed at the Adirondack Museum until 1965, and during his time in New York State, published the Visual Files Coding Index (1960) and developed a micro reader. In 1965, Inverarity returned to California, where he worked as an illustrator and book designer at University of California Press. In 1969, he became director of the Philadelphia Maritime Museum, where he worked until his retirement in 1976. He sold his extensive personal collection of Northwest Coast Indian art to the British Museum's Museum of Mankind in 1975. Inverarity lived in La Jolla, California until his death in 1999.

Duncan George Inverarity (1868-1949), was a prominent figure in the vaudeville theatrical circuit and in Seattle society. He was also a photographer, working for Edward Curtis and taking part in the Harriman Alaska expedition of 1899.

He was born in Dunedin, New Zealand, the son of Rosalind Harriet M. Wallace-Dunlop Inverarity (1843-1916) and William David Inverarity (1833-1902), both immigrants to New Zealand from Scotland. William Inverarity had been a captain in the Gordon Highlanders, an infantry regiment of the British army. William emigrated to New Zealand after his marriage, and shortly after Duncan's birth, moved his family to Australia. Around 1869-1870, the William Inverarity family moved to Argentina, where Duncan's sister Madeline was born, and where the family owned a ranch for sheep and cattle. William Inverarity returned to England with a large fortune around 1874, but decided to move his family to the United States to take part in the California gold rush. William Inverarity lost the family fortune quickly in California, apparently through investment deals with dubious business partners. These losses caused the Inverarity family to move northward to pursue farming again, this time in Oregon, and to send seven-year-old Duncan back to England for his schooling. William Inverarity sold his farm in Oregon in the early 1880s and bought land in the Yakima Valley in Washington State, where Duncan rejoined the family in 1883. In 1890, he enrolled at the University of Michigan, where he completed a law degree. In 1892, he returned to Seattle and entered the law firm of Stratton Lewis & Gilman (subsequently Lewis, Hardin and Albertson) as a law clerk. His father William died in Yakima in 1902. His mother Rosalind appears to have returned to England at some point, and she died in Sussex in 1916.

Duncan's career in legal work did not flourish, and in 1903, Duncan began work as a clerk for the King County Treasurer. From Duncan's memoir, it seems that around 1902-1903, he may also have begun his acquaintance with the theatrical managers John Cort and Alexander Pantages. Around 1904, Duncan married Anna A. Petersen (circa 1878-1941), who was born in Vila, Denmark and came to the United States in 1895. The couple had two sons: Wallace, born 1904, and Robert Bruce, born 1909.

In Seattle directories, he is listed as Assistant Manager of the Grand Opera House 1905-1907. He worked at the Coliseum Theater in Seattle from 1907-1908. He was assistant general manager for the Sullivan Considine Circuit from 1908-1910. The Tillikums of Elttaes, a "booster" organization in Seattle, employed him as Secretary, and in that capacity he helped to organize the "Potlatches" held in Seattle in 1912-1914. In 1915, Duncan Inverarity moved to Calgary, Alberta to manage a theater owned by Pantages. He seems to have worked for Pantages until at least 1926, also managing a Pantages theater in Spokane, Washington. During his career, Duncan also worked for John Danz, the owner of the Sterling theater chain in Washington State. In the late 1930s, Duncan Inverarity seems to have moved back to Seattle, where he worked as a salesman and credit manager. Anna Inverarity died in 1941, in Seattle. Duncan died in Burlington, Washington in 1949.