Byron Glenn Abernathy was born on December 12, 1909 near Bushnell, Nebraska. He was the first child of Peter Lemuel Abernathy, an Iowa farmhand, and Anna Lucretia Castle, an Albia, Iowa schoolteacher. His first six years were spent on the farm there in Nebraska, with his two younger brothers, Roy, born on July 5, 1912 and Newton born about two years later. The family moved from Nebraska southward to Mountain Grove, Ozarks County, Missouri, where his sister Mary Edith was born in 1917. Byron had just started going to school when the family moved to Missouri. That area of Missouri is part of the Ozarks mountain range where its' people have their own unique culture and accent. However, when Byron started picking up the local accent, his mother Anna decided they needed to move on, so in 1918 they moved to Ottawa, Kansas and bought an 80 acre farm there. Just two years later they moved to Baldwin, Kansas, and then in 1922 they moved to a farm near Sterling Kansas, where they lived until May, 1930. Byron graduated from Sterling, Kansas High School in May, 1929.

By early 1930 the economic Depression had set in around the country. Anna's cousin Emmet Castle told her that things were better in Oregon where he had moved, so Lemuel sold his farm at a loss and they moved to the area near Philomath, in Benton County, Oregon in May, 1930. They attempted to raise and sell turkeys and sell cream, but were not successful at this enterprise because of the Depression. In the meantime, Byron became acquainted with a local girl, Vera Huffman, the daughter of Chester Huffman, a Westwood rancher on the Alsea Highway. Byron worked at odd jobs whenever he could find any work, which was very scarce. He started attending college in Corvallis at what was then called Oregon Agricultural College, but is now known as Oregon State University. He was only able to attend college for one year, before his family's pressing economic needs forced him to look for work. He worked on dairy farms for as little as $1.00 per day, worked at the lumber mills near Philomath, and worked at a gas station pumping gas for a few months.

When Franklin Roosevelt was elected President in 1932 and took office in early 1933, one of the ways he convinced Congress to jumpstart the country back on a healthy economic track, was the creation of the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), which employed young men to create Public Works projects around the country, especially in the West. This program was begun about 1934 and CCC camps were set up around Oregon. Vera's brother, Claude went to the Baker, Oregon camp, and Byron Abernathy signed up at a camp on the Oregon Coast, where he learned the trade of surveying. He returned to visit Vera whenever he could, though Vera was able to visit him once at the CCC camp, and they decided to get married and were wed at Vera's home on June 2, 1935, with Byron and Vera's relatives and friends in attendance. Byron continued to live and work at the CCC camp, until it was closed down, and the newly weds moved to a house in Philomath. Byron found employment with the Bonneville Power Administration, surveying the power line tower locations, which involved working in very rugged environments, and traveling all over Oregon and Washington. Vera lived with her parents while Byron was traveling and working elsewhere.
Byron and Vera's first child was born at the Good Samaritan Hospital in Corvallis, on July 5, 1937. Byron had traveled up to Portland to visit his parents and sister over the 4th of July holiday, because they had moved there the previous year. He didn't think the child would be born for another week, but Vera went into labor late on the night of the 4th, and when Byron found out by phone, he traveled down to Corvallis by bus the next morning, but arrived several hours after the 4:00 am birth of his first son, whom he named Glenn Donald Abernathy.

The young family traveled to several Eastern Oregon and Washington towns where Byron was working, such as Shelton, Washington, Ellensburg, Washington, La Grande, Oregon and Grande Coulee, Washington. They usually rented cabins or small houses or whatever was available, many without electricity or running water. Another son, Robert Alan Abernathy was born in the summer of 1939. also at the Corvallis Hospital, since Vera stayed with her parents during the late months of her pregnancy. A third son, Keith George Abernathy, was also born in Corvallis in the winter of 1941, and by then the family had decided to look for more permanent employment at a more stable location, and moved to Portland, Oregon, in early 1942 and rented a house on S.E. 18th Ave., between S. E. Stark and Oak Streets. The oldest child, called Donald by his family, was able to begin attending Kindergarten in September, 1942 at Buckman public Grade School, which was located immediately across from the house they rented. During the war years, Byron worked on Swan Island where ships were being built- he worked as a surveyor, providing layout lines for the ship's construction. About 1944, Byron was hired as a surveyor for the City of Portland. By the summer of 1943, Byron had borrowed $1,000 from his dad, who lived about a half block from the house that Byron had rented, and the young family bought a house about a block east, at 1913 S. E. Oak St., an older two story house with a basement and a colonial style porch, the total purchase price was just over $3,000 (After they sold the house, it later had a full restoration remodel, and was offered for sale for almost $200,000.) During the war years the family car was a 1937 Hudson Terraplane. The family lived in the house on Oak St. for over 45 years, and Byron worked at remodeling parts of the basement, putting in an extra bedroom and partial bathroom in the basement in late 1950's, and with the help of friends, he put in a hardwood floor for the living and dining room and hallway of the first floor.

After the birth of Keith, Byron and Vera had decided that three children were enough, so Byron went to a Doctor for a vasectomy. Medical procedures in the early 1940's were not always trustworthy, and in September, 1942, they had another son, Gary Warren, his birth in Portland was totally unexpected, but he was well beloved by both his parents. Byron's parents continued to live about 1 block away, until his mother Anna passed away in 1949. His dad then moved out to a small house near the Portland Airport, but when the Vanport floods of 1949 came, the house was washed away from its foundation. Lemuel lived in Portland until early 1953, when he moved to Corvallis where he rented a small house, until he had a stroke in October of that year and passed away.

All of Byron's four sons went to grade school at Buckman Grade School, only 2 blocks from where they lived, and three sons, Donald, Bob and Gary went to Washington High School which was located less than a half mile from their house, and Keith went to Benson High School where he learned the printing trade. During the 1940's, Byron made sure his sons attended Sunday School at Centenary Wilbur Methodist Church. Donald went on to go to college at Portland State College, at that time located in the old Lincoln High School building in southwest downtown Portland, where he attended engineering classes for two years. Bob had some delinquency problems and did not fiinish high school, but instead, went into the U.S. Air Force at the age of 17. Gary graduated from Washington High School in 1961 and went on to attend Portland State College for 4 years and got a bachelor's degree in business in 1965

During the 1950's, Byron and Vera enjoyed square dancing with friends and acquaintances. Byron continued to work as a surveyor, and advanced to be a crew chief and head surveyor during the 1950's. Vera stayed home doing the homemaking and raising their four sons. About 1954, Byron had an accident when he slipped and hit his head while surveying in a large culvert pipe. He was taken to the nearest hospital and recovered from the accident in a few days, but the injury may have had a permanent effect, because he sometimes had head aches and a few fainting spells after that. He also had to have hernia operations, once in the 1940's and again in the late 1950's. In February, 1960, while they were driving to visit some friends, they were struck by a car driven by a young man who had run a red light. Vera was hospitalized with a broken collar bone, but Byron only had some contusions and bruises.

About 1958, Vera had begun working as a cafeteria worker at Buckman grade school. She worked at that job until the middle of 1965 when Bobs' wife, Barbara, died suddenly after a brain hemorage, only a week after giving birth to a son in Arkansas. Bob called for help and Byron and Vera flew to Arkansas and decided to raise the baby, named Alan, so they took the baby back to Portland and Vera quit her job at Buckman grade school. The child turned out to be autistic and was very difficult to raise, so Byron and Vera sacrificed much of their personal lives to raise their grandchild, even though they were both over 55 years old. Some years later, after their youngest son Gary had married, in 1968, and Vera's brother, George Huffman passed away in April 1969, a few months after Vera's mother Elma had passed away at the Good Samaritan Hospital in Corvallis, Oregon. Vera inherited George's house and she sold it to her son Gary and his new wife, Sharon King. Gary and Sharon decided to help Gary's parents by raising young Alan, about 1970, and they took the young boy to live with them in their new house. They soon became parents themselves with a son named Bret, and two years later, another son named Roland Daniel. The difficulty of raising an autistic child and two babies of their own soon became apparent, and when Bob had remarried for the fourth time, in Panama City, Florida, he decided that he could raise young Alan, even though he was still in the Air Force.

Byron had become a registered surveyor for the State of Oregon in the early 1950's and frequently he did private surveys on his own time for land owners, mainly in the City of Portland. Sometimes, his sons, Glenn Donald and later Gary, helped him with these surveys. Byron and Vera liked to travel to different places around the United States with friends, and once visited their son Keith while he was stationed in Texas, during his 4 years in the Air Force from 1960-1964. They also visited theit son Bob when he was stationed in Arkansas, Utah, and later in Florida, mostly by driving to those locations. They enjoyed traveling to Mexico several times to resorts such as Acapulco and Mazatlan, in the late 1960's and 1970's.

Byron retired from his job as a surveying supervisor at City Hall in 1975. He always had had a tendency to worry about circumstances and family problems, and twice, anxiety brought on fainting spells while he was talking on the phone. Most of his friends knew about his often pessimistic outlook, but he had many close friends and was very friendly and talkative by nature. He enjoyed walking around the neighborhood and talking to any neighbors who were outside . He always allowed his wife Vera to handle most of the finances and she often had to watch out that his generosity didn't create problems with their meager budget. Vera was usually the one who said no to the salesmen. Byron never really developed any hobbies, since he was usually too busy making a living and taking care of his family. After he retired, Byron and Vera continued to travel with friends to such places as San Francisco, New England in the Autumn, New York, The Virgin Islands, New Orleans and several times to Florida to visit their son Bob and his wife in Panama City, Florida. They went on an Alaskan tour with two of their close friends, Ray and Martha Kindorf, but had to cut short the tour when Ray was diagnosed with colon cancer. After Ray died, they continued to take Martha out to dinner and restaurants they all had enjoyed. However, on New Years Eve, 1985, after they were taking Martha back to her apartment building, suddenly they were accosted by two young African-American muggers who dashed out from the shadows and snatched Vera's purse, hurling her to the ground, where she fractured her left pelvis. She was hospitalized for several weeks, and had to have a hip replacement, which never really worked correctly thereafter. Byron was not seriously injured by the muggers, but when his Keizer hospital insurance refused to cover Vera's injuries because they occured on the grounds of the apartment building, the stress brought on a heart attack and Byron had to have a double bypass, at the age of 75. He recovered gradually, but his health was never the same again. A few years later he almost died from a blocked and perforated colon, but the doctors were able to cleanse out the toxins and install a colostomy, which he had to wear for almost a year, but eventually was able to surgically remove.

As they grew older, the maintenance and upkeep of the house became more of a problem. By the end of the 1980's they had decided to sell their house and bought a mobile home in Albany, Oregon, to be close to their youngest son, Gary who lived near Albany with his wife and four children. They moved into their new dwelling in the autumn of 1990. They lived there until, in January, 1992, Byron had another heart attack and his heart was badly damaged. He was hospitalized at the Good Samaritan Hospital in Corvallis for a few weeks, but then was sent home, but developed pneumonia and was rushed back to the same Hospital. His children and neighbors visited him there and he expressed his love for them all, but it was obvious to all that his condition was worsening. At 3:00 a.m. on the morning of February 8, 1992, Byron passed away in his sleep. He was dearly beloved by his wife and children and his many friends and is his memory remains with them! He was buried at his prearranged burial site on the hill of the Old Rugged Cross, Skyline Memorial Cemetery in Washington County, west of Portland.