Byron Wilbur Bender

Byron Wilbur Bender was born on August 14, 1929, to a Mennonite family in Roaring Spring, Pennsylvania, and was raised on a dairy farm until the age of 10 when his family moved to Elkhart, Indiana. His father had been named Treasurer of the Mennonite Board of Missions and Charities and Byron had the opportunity during this period to travel with his father to visit orphanages and retirement homes overseen by the Mennonite Church.

During World War II, Byron was sent to Hesston College and Bible School in Kansas to complete his last two years of high school. Upon graduation, in the summer of 1946, Byron joined an all-Mennonite crew of young men aboard a ship to deliver 800-some horses to post- war Poland. This was Byron’s first exposure to foreign cultures and languages.

In the fall of 1946, Byron enrolled in Goshen College, a Mennonite college located in Goshen, Indiana, where he met his future wife, Lois Marie Graber. He noticed Lois in the registration line and courted her for four years. Byron graduated from Goshen College in 1949 with a degree in English. He then went to Indiana University (IU) where he was introduced to the field of linguistics. In 1950, he received an MA in Linguistics from IU and returned briefly to Goshen, where he married Lois.

Lois joined him at IU where Byron became a PhD student in the linguistics program. After completing his course work at IU in 1953, Byron was presented with an employment opportunity to work as a linguist for the Trust Territory the Pacific Islands (TTPI) doing research in support of the development of a bilingual education curriculum. He took the position, which was eliminated a month after he arrived in Majuro because of budget cuts by the Eisenhower administration. A teaching position at the local high school became available and Byron accepted it. Lois, who had been waiting in Honolulu due to a housing shortage in Majuro, joined Byron.

Teaching in the Marshall Islands in the early 1950s, where the availability of housing, running water, electricity, and even food were not guaranteed, required flexibility and resourcefulness. Byron taught school, trained teachers, ran a print shop, and even gave a course in celestial navigation. At the house where he and Lois lived, he set up a darkroom to develop photos he had taken of family and Marshallese students. When there was fallout from atomic bomb testing on the Marshallese atoll of Bikini in 1954, Byron assisted as a liaison between the displaced Marshallese and the U.S. Government in efforts to reunite families that had been separated during relocation. Trained as a linguist, Byron began to analyze the Marshallese language as he learned to speak it, and he began to collect data that became the basis for his PhD dissertation. After completing his first two-year contract in Micronesia, Byron signed on for two additional two-year terms. During these six years, Byron and Lois’s first three children were born—Susan, Sarah, and Catherine. Byron was a conscientious objector and his first two years teaching in Micronesia served to fulfill the draft board’s alternative service requirement.

In 1960, Byron was hired as an Assistant Professor of Linguistics and Anthropology at Goshen College. While at Goshen, the last two Bender children were born—Judith and John—and Byron completed his doctoral dissertation. In 1963, IU awarded Byron a PhD in linguistics with a minor in anthropology.

In 1962, Byron returned to Micronesia, this time to Saipan. He was hired as the English Language Supervisor for the TTPI. After two years, a position at the University of Hawaii opened up in its newly established Department of Linguistics. Byron applied and was offered the position at its Manoa campus. (UHM).

For the next 35 years, Byron taught linguistics at the UHM until he retired in 1999. He started as an Associate Professor in the English Language Institute. In 1969, he was awarded tenure and became Chair of the Department of Linguistics. As Chair, Byron demonstrated fairness and a gentle touch in his administration of the department. That his colleagues endorsed his chairmanship for 10 three-year terms is a testament to his leadership and peace-making skills. Byron also served as President of the University of Hawaii Professional Assembly (1983-1988). His contributions continued beyond retirement as Editor of Oceanic Linguistics and as a member of the University of Hawaii Board of Regents.

Byron loved his family and always found time to listen and give advice to his children when they sought it. In the mid-60s, he and Lois purchased a newly constructed house. Everyone was sleeping on mattresses on the floor. Byron purchased an electric saw and lumber, taught himself how to use the saw, and constructed 6 beds with drawers built in under the bed frame. Byron’s woodworking skills expanded to bookshelves, magazine racks, a built-in sofa, a dining room table, and a desk. Not too many years later, Byron took up cooking.

Lois and Byron were long-time members of the Honolulu Friends Meeting. Byron served as Clerk of the Meeting, Clerk of Oversight and Counsel, Treasurer, and Clerk of the Finance Committee.

Byron is survived by his wife Lois, five children, Susan Bender, Sarah Fagan, Catherine Bender, Judith Bender, and John Bender, and four grandchildren, Emily and Thomas Fagan and Sophie and Charlotte Bender.