Her father died when Iva was a girl; her mother remarried to Arthur J. Thorne in 1889.

[1] She attended the Lawrence Conservatory of Music in Appleton, Wisconsin in 1894 and 1895, with further training in Chicago and in Europe.

[5] Weaver was a soprano soloist in oratorio and recital events, most often in the Midwestern and Plains states,[6][7] but she sang in Los Angeles in 1915,[8] and in New York City and on radio in 1926.

[11] "She not only sings well technically, but has that poetry and warmth which so many excellent musicians lack", commented one reporter in 1914.

"[12] She was the Milwaukee correspondent for the weekly magazine Music News,[13] and was active in the Musicians' Club of Women, a Chicago-based organization.