VBC programs connect and heal,
educate and inspire.
Everyone is always welcome.

The Veterans Breakfast Club (VBC) is the nation’s premier non-profit for connecting veterans with their fellow Americans through inspiring stories of service.

Our goal is to build a nation that understands and values the experiences of our military veterans so that every day is Veterans Day.

We do this by bringing together–in-person and online–men and women from all walks of life, all ages and eras, and every branch of service to talk about what they’ve seen and done. We want to hear how people’s military service has shaped them. “Every Veteran Has a Story” is our slogan. We want to hear every one.

We share the stories we hear in our weekly VBC Bulletin email newsletter and our quarterly VBC Magazine. We also record a weekly podcast, The Scuttlebutt, about military culture from the people who lived it.

We do all this because we believe the best way to thank a Veteran is to listen.

Listening is what the VBC has been doing for the past 15 years, when we held our first small event outside of Pittsburgh. Since then, we’ve held over 1,000 programs in-person and online and have welcomed over 20,000 different people at our events, Veterans and non-Veterans coming together to listen.

We value every veteran’s experience, no matter who they are or when or how they served. We’ve seen up close the power of storytelling, as the memories shared at VBC events connect, heal, educate, and inspire an ever-expanding circle of listeners.

At any given event, you might hear from the newest members of Space Force to a 101-year-old World War II veteran.

We’ve welcomed Tin Can Sailors and Montford Point Marines, Vietnam Sky Soldiers and Cold War intelligence officers. We’ve heard stories from the Horn of Africa to Antarctica, the Bering Sea to Diego Garcia, and all points in between.

LORAN Coast Guardsmen and Radar Station Airmen have told us about serving in some of the most remote places on earth.

Korean War veterans have borne witness to their “forgotten war.”

Other “forgotten warriors” shared their memories of Beirut, Grenada, and Mogadishu.

Some of the first women authorized for combat shared stories of fighting in Iraq and Afghanistan, and of the Purple Hearts they received.

Join us at our events and help keep these stories alive.

All you need to do is listen.

Every Veteran Has a Story.
Hear Them Now.

WHAT WE BELIEVE
OUR PROGRAMS
OUR MISSION

UPCOMING EVENTS

OktoberFest Pittsburgh with the Veterans Breakfast Club: Monday, October 7, 5:30pm-8:00pm

Date: October 7, 2024
Time: 5:30 pm - 8:00 pm
Location: Market Square Pittsburgh (parking: 228 Forbes Ave, Pittsburgh, PA 15222)
Events | In-Person Events | Online Events
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The VBC with the Pittsburgh Downtown Partnership and veteran-owned AE Works is hosting a Veterans OktoberFest Night in Market Square Pittsburgh on Monday, October 7 from 5:30-8:00pm.

This is a FREE event under a giant tent in Market Square as part of the 10-day OktoberFest, from October 3-13.

The event will be live-streamed on Zoom, YouTube, and Facebook, from 6:00pm-7:30pm ET. The Zoom can be joined here at 6:00pm on October 7.

Food will be available for purchase, and EVERY PERSON registered for the event with the Veterans Breakfast Club will receive one free beer, a second at half price, and $5 parking in the Market Square Parking Garage.

At 6:30pm, we’ll hold a one-hour storytelling program featuring Cold War veterans–those who served between 1945-1991–especially in Germany. The program will be livestreamed and will commemorate the 35th Anniversary of the Fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989.

Non-Veterans are especially welcome to attend and pay tribute to our Cold War Veterans and hear their stories of service.

Please plan to join us in-person or online for this special event!

Register for the event here for the in-person experience!

Thank you to our Premier Sponsor, AE Works!

 

 

 

IN-PERSON Event McCandless, PA: October 10, 2024 @ 8:30am-10:30am

Date: October 10, 2024
Time: 8:30 am - 10:30 am
Location: Ridgecrest Senior Living (8870 Duncan Ave, Pittsburgh, PA 15237)
Events | In-Person Events
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Join us for a FREE VBC breakfast at Ridgecrest Senior Living in McCandless on Thursday, October 10 at 8:30am. Please RSVP for this free breakfast event by calling 412-623-9029 or emailing betty@veteransbreakfastclub.org.

Everyone is welcome, veterans and non-veterans, and the breakfast will be provided for free courtesy of Ridgecrest Senior Living.

We plan our usual fast-moving and wide-ranging program with lots of participation. We’ll have veterans of various ages and branches of service sharing their stories of service.

Breakfast is served at 8:30am. At 9:00am, we start the program. For the next 90 minutes, veterans share slices of their service experience. You never know what you’re going to hear, and there’s always new people with new memories to offer.

RSVP by calling 412-623-9029 or emailing betty@veteransbreakfastclub.org. Please make sure to RSVP for events at least two days in advance. We understand that your schedule can change quickly, but advance notice of attendance always helps us and our venues prepare the program. Thank you!

Thank you to our event sponsors Hope Hospice, Fox Rehab, Ridgecrest Senior Living, Julian Gray Associates, Assisted Living Locators, Simplified Professional Organizing, Concordia Visiting Nurses

 

 

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PAST EVENTS

Streamed live on September 23, 2024 VBC Scuttlebutt welcomes bestselling author Kristin Hannah to talk about her wildy popular and well-reviewed novel The Women. The book tells the story of Frances “Frankie” McGrath, a young woman from a privileged California family who defies societal expectations to serve as an Army...
Streamed live on September 23, 2024 VBC Scuttlebutt welcomes bestselling author Kristin Hannah to talk about her wildy popular and well-reviewed novel The Women. The...
Streamed live on September 16, 2024 Ralph Galati shares the story of his harrowing experience as a prisoner of war (POW) during the Vietnam War....
Streamed live on September 9, 2024 In his award-winning book of short stories, Surrender, Brian O’Hare delves into the complexities of the American hero myth...
Streamed live on September 5, 2024 US Army Colonel Arthur Lee Shreve survived the Bataan Death March and years as a POW of the Japanese...
WATCH MORE PAST EVENTS

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The mission of the Veterans Breakfast Club is to create communities of listening around veterans and their stories to ensure that this living history will never be forgotten.  We believe that through our work, people will be connected, educated, healed, and inspired.

INTRODUCING THE VETERANS HISTORY PROJECT

Preserving veterans’ stories so that this living history is never forgotten.

We pair passionate VBC volunteers with military veterans for one-on-one oral history interviews over Zoom. If you are a veteran, or you know a veteran, who would be interested in sharing his or her story with us, let us know. If you are someone interested in conducting these interviews, please reach out!

GET INVOLVED

Your weekly dose of veterans’ stories, military news, and the latest headlines, all in one place

Watch and listen to the Scuttlebutt, the VBC’s podcast dedicated to understanding military culture. Hosted by Shaun Hall, Director of Programming. New episode every Monday at 6AM ET.

MORE EPISODES

Get the latest on military headlines and VBC news sent straight to your inbox. Sign up for the VBCBulletin! 

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Latest Blog Posts

written by Todd DePastino James Wilson at Viking Bags contacted me the other day to ask how the VBC could help connect their company–which makes...
Written by Todd DePastino WWII veteran Joe Gortiz passed away at 102 years old after falling and breaking his hip this past summer. Until then,...
Written by Todd DePastino Highlights of the first day of the 2024 Imperial War Museum’s Duxford Air Show included a jaw-dropping and eardrum-rattling display of...
Courtesy USAF veteran John Kramer written by Todd DePastino The highlight of our WWII Air Fields Tour of England earlier this month was accompanying 102-year-old...
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VBC Magazine of Veterans Stories
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