Kirkham was born on June 20, 1982 in Utah. He had been drawing since he was very young and started off drawing comics for the newspaper. A friend of his lived near Top Cow studio in L.A. and offered to show his work to Top Cow, he was offered to draw for an independent series. He got to learn from Marc Silvestri himself and was eventually offered a full time job at Top Cow studio. So Kirkham packed his things and moved to L.A.