Aberly Pet and Rev. Dr. John Aberly

Aberly Pet, a colony located north of Kugler campus in Guntur is named in honor of the Aberly family for their contributions in missionary and literary work for over three decades.

John Aberly was born in Pennsylvania, studied at Gettysburg College and graduated as the first honors of his class in 1888. Afterwards, he studied in the Lutheran Theological Seminary. He married Alice Strauss of Gilbert on August 3, 1889. They were called to serve the Lord as missionaries. In November, 1889 they left for India and reached Guntur on January 18, 1890.

The Aberlys served among the Telugu people for over three decades and educated Telugu Church leaders, pastors, Bible trained teachers, and gospel workers until 1923. Initially, Rev. Aberly labored for two years in the Narasaraopet field, after which he took charge of the Boarding School, the Theological Training School and the Telugu congregation at Guntur. He acted as Principal of Andhra Christian College during the period when Dr. L. B. Wolf was away on furlough or on other duties. Mrs. Alice Aberly worked with boarding school children, women of the congregation and church music.

Rev. John Aberly learned Telugu and authored Telugu Bible Dictionary that took about 20 years to complete. Apart from editing various church periodicals in Telugu, he authored Telugu commentary for seven Bible books that included Mark, Acts and Romans. He also authored Telugu Union Hymn book that shows Telugu hymns in English metres. His scholarly Telugu literary works remain a great gift to the Telugu churches in the years to come. After serving for 33 years, on February 27, 1923 the Aberlys left for America.

After returning to the United Sates in 1926, Reverend Aberly served as the president of Lutheran Theological Seminary, Gettysburg till 1940. Rev. Dr. John Aberly served God humbly with deep devotion all through his life and was called to his eternal reward at the age of 96.