Juanita Abernathy was born on 1 December 1931 in Uniontown, Alabama, USA. She was married to Ralph Abernathy. She died on 12 September 2019 in Atlanta, Georgia, USA.
She worked at the forefront of the civil rights movement alongside her husband, the Rev. Ralph Abernathy, and the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. She survived a bombing of the family's home in Montgomery, Ala., in 1957. The Baptist church where her husband was a pastor was destroyed by a bomb the same night.