At the Veterans Breakfast Club,
Stories Unite Us.
Check out our online & in-person veterans storytelling programs and see our full event schedule below. All are welcome to join us!
Our Veterans Breakfast Club’s Open Conversation gathers veterans, military family members, history buffs, and interested people of all sorts together in a Zoom room without an agenda. We then talk for 90 minutes.
Once a month, we dispense with the scheduled guest and prepared program and turn the microphone over to the people who show up. Bring a story, a question, a memory, something you’ve been thinking about, or simply your curiosity. You never quite know where the conversation will go.
A question about a veteran’s hat might lead to a discussion about coming home from Vietnam and what “thank you for your service” means. A conversation about flying drones can become a debate about technology, combat, and moral responsibility. Someone might introduce a veteran we’ve never met before, pull out an old photograph, remember a friend who has died, recommend a book, ask how things were done in the military 50 years ago, or raise a question that sends the whole group down an unexpected historical rabbit hole.
There is no featured guest and no predetermined topic. We all create the program as we go. Veterans from different branches, generations, ranks, specialties, and eras compare experiences and discover where they overlap—and where they don’t. Non-veterans ask the questions they’ve always wanted to ask. Sometimes the conversation is serious. Sometimes it’s funny. Often one story triggers another, and we wind up someplace none of us expected when the evening began.
You don’t need to be a veteran to participate, and you don’t need to have a story ready. Some people come to talk. Others come to ask questions. And some simply come to listen.
Join us Monday, November 2 at 7:00pm ET on Zoom, Facebook, or YouTube and be part of the conversation!
The VBC is holding a special Burgers & Craft Beer with Veterans event at Grist House Craft Brewery on Tuesday, October 20th from 5pm – 9pm.
DATE: Tuesday, October 20 at 5pm
LOCATION: 10 E SHERMAN ST, MILLVALE, PA 15209
COST: $20 per person ($25 at the door) and includes one beer and one burger and chips.
REGISTER: Please register for this event here: https://lp.constantcontactpages.com/ev/reg/wkbzm4f
We had such a terrific time last year that we are going to do it again!
Foodtruck burgers aren’t for breakfast. Neither is beer. So, why does the Veterans Breakfast Club hold an event at Grist House Brewing on a warm, Tuesday evening?
We do it for the stories. We’ll set up our PA system for an Open-mic night. Come share a story at the unique indoor-outdoor Grist House space and hear from veterans and their families about their service and their experiences in and around the military.
Our annual Burgers and Craft Beer event draws people from around the region for a relaxed and fun vibe, great food and drink, and our own VBC infused recipe of education, inspiration and connection.
Join us!
Everyone is welcome, and you don’t need to be a veteran to attend.
Bring your kids. Bring your dogs. Bring your friends.
We’ll have the whole place to ourselves, and we’re grateful to Grist House for opening their doors up to the Veterans Breakfast Club for this special evening.
Maurice L. “Chipp” Naylon IV served nine years as a U.S. Marine Corps infantry officer. In 2014–2015, he deployed to Afghanistan as a combat advisor and operations officer working with soldiers from the Republic of Georgia assigned to help defend Bagram Airfield. By then, America had been at war in Afghanistan for more than thirteen years, and Washington was preparing to declare an “end to combat operations.” On the ground, however, Naylon and his Marines were still leaving the wire, hunting for rocket teams and bomb makers, encountering IEDs, and trying to protect one of the largest American bases in the country.
Naylon tells that story in his book The New Ministry of Truth: Combat Advisors in Afghanistan and America’s Great Betrayal. It is less a conventional combat memoir than an account of the widening gap he saw between policy and reality—and of what that gap meant for the servicemembers ordered to carry out the mission.
Naylon’s deployment also offers an unusual window into the complicated coalition war in Afghanistan. His small team of Marines advised a Georgian infantry battalion whose soldiers had their own reasons for being there, while working alongside Afghan National Army forces and operating under an American chain of command. Success depended not simply on firepower but on relationships, trust, cultural understanding, intelligence, and rules of engagement that Naylon increasingly believed prevented his Marines from confronting threats before those threats confronted them.
One phrase captures his larger criticism of the war: “We weren’t in Afghanistan for 20 years. We were in Afghanistan for one year, 20 times.” Units rotated in and out, knowledge disappeared, missions changed, and the people arriving often had to rediscover lessons learned by those who had come before them.
Yet Naylon’s story isn’t simply one of anger or disillusionment. He remains intensely proud of the Marines he served with and of the Georgian soldiers they trained and advised. During seven months in Afghanistan, he watched their combined force develop from struggling with basic patrols into conducting complex nighttime operations with Afghan and American forces. That pride in what servicemembers accomplished at the tactical level exists alongside a much harder question about the larger war: What did those accomplishments ultimately add up to?
Join the Veterans Breakfast Club for a candid conversation with Chipp Naylon about advising foreign troops, defending Bagram, restrictive rules of engagement, leadership and loyalty, the frustrations of coalition warfare, and the strange experience of fighting a war that officials back home were declaring over. We’ll also talk about the fall of Afghanistan in 2021 and the question that runs throughout Naylon’s book and the experiences of so many Afghanistan veterans: What did our service there mean?
Join the Veterans Breakfast Club for a FREE VBC breakfast at the Cranberry Elks Lodge #2249 on Tuesday, October 27 at 8:30am. Please RSVP for this free breakfast event by calling 412-623-9029 or emailing Joann@veteransbreakfastclub.org .
Everyone is welcome, veterans and non-veterans alike, and breakfast will be provided free of charge courtesy of the Veterans Breakfast Club and our hosts at the Cranberry Elks Lodge #2249.
We’ll have our usual fast-moving and wide-ranging program with plenty of participation, stories, laughter, and conversation. Veterans of different eras and branches of service will share memories and reflections from their time in uniform—and often from life before and after service as well.
Breakfast begins 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 are always new faces and new stories around the table.
Please RSVP by calling 412-623-9029 or emailing joann@veteransbreakfastclub.org.
Event Details:
Tuesday, October 27, 2026
8:30am–10:30am
Cranberry Elks Lodge #2249
20720 Route 19
Cranberry Township, PA 16066
Our Veterans Breakfast Club’s Open Conversation gathers veterans, military family members, history buffs, and interested people of all sorts together in a Zoom room without an agenda. We then talk for 90 minutes.
Once a month, we dispense with the scheduled guest and prepared program and turn the microphone over to the people who show up. Bring a story, a question, a memory, something you’ve been thinking about, or simply your curiosity. You never quite know where the conversation will go.
A question about a veteran’s hat might lead to a discussion about coming home from Vietnam and what “thank you for your service” means. A conversation about flying drones can become a debate about technology, combat, and moral responsibility. Someone might introduce a veteran we’ve never met before, pull out an old photograph, remember a friend who has died, recommend a book, ask how things were done in the military 50 years ago, or raise a question that sends the whole group down an unexpected historical rabbit hole.
There is no featured guest and no predetermined topic. We all create the program as we go. Veterans from different branches, generations, ranks, specialties, and eras compare experiences and discover where they overlap—and where they don’t. Non-veterans ask the questions they’ve always wanted to ask. Sometimes the conversation is serious. Sometimes it’s funny. Often one story triggers another, and we wind up someplace none of us expected when the evening began.
You don’t need to be a veteran to participate, and you don’t need to have a story ready. Some people come to talk. Others come to ask questions. And some simply come to listen.
Join us Monday, November 2 at 7:00pm ET on Zoom, Facebook, or YouTube and be part of the conversation!
Join us in Bethel Park, PA, for a FREE VBC storytelling event where you’ll meet a remarkable collection of people, each with a story to tell.
Our breakfast location in Bethel Park, PA, is our largest, where the group can reach over 250 people. Our veteran attendees range from WWII and Korean War through the Post-9/11 era. The program is fast-moving and wide-ranging with lots of participation. Everyone is welcome to join us.
We meet at Christ United Methodist Church (44 Highland Rd, Bethel Park 15102) in a large hall that also serves as a gym. We show photos of veterans on the three screens at the front and interact with as many veterans as we can. You’ll walk in, pick up your name badge, and meet others who are there to hear and share the stories. 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 joann@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: Jefferson Memorial Funeral Home and UPMC for Life!
