Our Founding
We have been in prison ministry for over 45 years. But it was back in 2015 when the ministry seemed destined for a major and challenging prospect. It was that year when there was a lot of excitement surrounding the release of the movie featuring the story of Chris Kyle – the American Sniper. Having watched the movie, I was moved by the changes in him when he returned home after each deployment. Each journey home showed noticeable changes in his personality and psyche.
Concurrent with the movie, I had been reading a lot about the Veteran suicide rate in our Country – some 22 veterans committing suicide every day. Obviously, our Veterans were coming home with trauma – either from injuries sustained in battle, or the mental challenges of returning from deployment. Something was not working in our vast VA healthcare system.
But then it struck me – who were the most neglected veterans – the ones without programs available to them? It is those military personnel who are incarcerated. I decided to reach out to those on our prison ministry mailing list to see how many Veterans were participating in our study programs, or if they knew of Veterans who might like to be a part of a new outreach.
The results of our inquiry were encouraging – about 150 Veterans signed up to be a part of what we might be able to offer. Patriots of Valor was born.
With that, we began with just an initial newsletter to send. The expansion happened naturally as more Veterans learned of it. Before long, our mailing list expanded and we started hearing stories from many of our incarcerated Veterans. It was apparent that many of them were in prison because of either untreated PTSD or a lack of programs that might have helped them.
The challenge was to figure out a way to assist within the parameters of the restrictive prison administrative hurdles. We designed a faith-based curriculum utilizing books written by Christians and other experts who had been dealing with trauma and its effects on the Veteran population. I wanted to implement this program in honor of Ellen’s brother – a man I never had the opportunity to meet – Hoyt Holmes Measimer – a 27 year Military career Veteran whose last rank was Chief Warrant Officer and who served two years as a Chinook and Chopper pilot in Vietnam. Over his storied Military career, he was awarded over 50 medals including two Distinguished Flying Crosses and Purple Hearts. His memory should live on, and the best way for me to do that was to name the Scholarship program in his name.
That program continues to grow…and with it more and more incarcerated Veterans get added to our mailing list.
Another logical outflow of the program was to do something to assist homeless Veterans who we hear so much about. “Boots to Stockings” was formed as an outreach to provide a Christmas stocking to our homeless Veterans. The stocking contained mostly toiletries and other necessary items for immediate healthcare needs.
While immediately successful, I wanted to ensure that the homeless Veteran population knew we were there for them – not just at Christmas, but throughout the year. Our program expanded to include Backpacks, Patriot Bags and other items that we now provide all through the year.
The Results…
As of the end of 2025, we now have over 1,100 incarcerated Veterans on our mailing list. For Christmas, we provided over 1,500 stockings and Holiday Bags to our homeless Veteran community, and during the year, we provided 445 Backpacks and 990 Patriot Bags. As to our Scholarship program for PTSD, we have graduated 51 Veterans from all 4 program phases and have enrolled over 300 Veterans into the program since its inception.
