When Ernest Von Smyres was born on 14 February 1928, in Kansas, United States, his father, Ernest Guy Smyres, was 23 and his mother, Nellie Lavelle Perkins, was 21. He married Rachel LaVon Ficken on 13 May 1947, in Clark, Washington, United States. They were the parents of at least 2 sons. He lived in Rice, Kansas, United States in 1935 and Oregon, United States in 2007. He died on 20 February 2009, in Polk, Oregon, United States, at the age of 81, and was buried in Rest Lawn Memory Gardens, West Salem, Polk, Oregon, United States.