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!
We look forward to our next breakfast at Monroeville United Methodist Church, whose pastor, Rev. Kelly J. Smith, has kindly embraced our mission by having the church pay for everyone’s breakfast!
We’ll meet at Monroeville United Methodist Church (219 Center Rd, Monroeville, PA 15146) in their fellowship hall. We’ll show photos of veterans on a screen and hear from as many veterans as possible during the program.
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 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 Point Pleasant for supporting this event!
Join us at Montgomery County Community College in Blue Bell, Pennsylvania, on Thursday, September 24, from 8:30am-10:30am for a morning of breakfast and veterans sharing stories. You don’t need to be a veteran to attend.
What: Veterans Storytelling Breakfast, FREE and open to the public, courtesy of Montgomery County Community College Veterans Club and Montgomery County Department of Veterans Affairs
Where: Montgomery County Community College (340 DeKalb Pike, Blue Bell, PA 19422) College Hall (park in Morris Road Lot, see map below. Handicap parking at College Hall)
When: Thursday, September 24, from 8:30am-10:30am.
How to RSVP: Leave your name and names of those in your party and a phone number to: 412-623-9029 or JoAnn@veteransbreakfastclub.org
The Veterans Breakfast Club brings American history to life. Join us to listen and learn, connect and heal, and say thank you to those who’ve served. You don’t need to be a veteran to attend.
Where else, but at the Veterans Breakfast Club, can you gather for a casual meal and meet a 101-year-old Navy WAVE codebreaker from World War II, a Silver Star recipient from Vietnam, and a Top Gun F-18 pilot all at the same time?
The Veterans Breakfast Club has been bringing these people and more together for face-to-face storytelling events since 2008. People come to listen and learn, connect and heal, and say thank you to those who’ve served.
These breakfasts began informally in 2008 with some 30 World War II veterans. They grew to give our organization its name and serve as the flagship for a growing array of storytelling programs where veterans of all eras and branches of service could share their experiences with the public. Most of these in-person events are held in the Pittsburgh region, but we’re branching out to other locations to reach more veterans and hear more stories. One week we might might be in a VFW hall, then next week a country club or a banquet room.
We serve breakfast at 8:30am, start the program at 9:00am, and bounce around the room with the microphone until 10:30am listening to as many veterans as we can. You never know what you’re going to hear. There are often a few tears, and always a lot of laughter. Join our community of listening by coming to one of our face-to-face storytelling events!
The Guadalcanal campaign was America’s first major ground offensive of World War II in the Pacific, but some of its most important fighting took place along a relatively small stretch of ground west of Henderson Field: the Matanikau River.
Author and Guadalcanal battlefield expert Dave Holland joins Veterans Breakfast Club to explore the repeated battles fought along the Matanikau front. Over several months, American and Japanese forces struggled for control of the river, surrounding ridges, and approaches to Henderson Field in a series of hard-fought engagements that helped shape the outcome of the campaign.
Drawing on years spent walking and researching the battlefields, Holland will take us onto the ground where Marines and Japanese troops fought and explain why the Matanikau became one of the most important—and often overlooked—fronts of the Guadalcanal campaign.
As a young teenager, Adais A. “Tony” Garcia, Jr., was running with gangs and headed down a dangerous road. After becoming involved in a crime, Tony found himself in court facing a grim and possible short future. Instead, a deal was worked out with a judge: when Tony was old enough, he would join the United States Army. And that deal put Adais on a whole different path.
Adais went on to serve an extraordinary 37 years in the Army, much of it in the Military Police, rising through the enlisted ranks to become a Sergeant Major. His long career included service connected to Operation Garden Plot during the Los Angeles riots, Operation Noble Eagle, Operation Iraqi Freedom, Operation Enduring Freedom, Operation Jump Start, and Operation New Dawn. In Iraq, he served at the Multi-National Corps-Iraq level overseeing and tracking military police operations throughout the theater and later as NCOIC of a Personal Security Detachment conducting convoy and security missions. His decorations include the Bronze Star, two Army Commendation Medals, and the Combat Action Badge.
Tony also carries an unusual American family history. He traces his ancestry to Nathaniel Jackson, a Cherokee settler who brought his family from Alabama to the Rio Grande Valley in 1857, along with eleven formerly enslaved people whom Jackson had freed and who chose to remain with the family. Jackson established a ranch near the Rio Grande, became fiercely loyal to the Union, and, according to local histories, helped enslaved people escape to freedom and served as an intelligence agent for Union forces during the Civil War.
Join us on VBC LIVE for a remarkable conversation about crime and second chances, war and military service, plus the inspiration he finds in his family history. Most of all, we want to understand how a wayward teenager headed full-blast down a dead-end road become a career soldier entrusted with leading other in war.
Read about Adais in Iraq in 2010: https://www.dvidshub.net/news/52963/sustainment-brigades-personal-security-detachment-conducts-first-mission
Join us at Seven Oaks Country Club in Beaver, PA for a Veterans Breakfast Club storytelling breakfast on Wednesday, September 30, 2026, from 8:30–10:30am—a warm, come-as-you-are morning of coffee, buffet breakfast, and true stories of military service.
This year, every VBC event is now completely free and open to the public. That means no charge for breakfast. But we do need a reservation, so please let us know you’re coming. Then, take a seat among veterans, family members, and neighbors who want to listen, learn, and connect.
If you’ve never been to a VBC event, the format is simple: we gather for a casual meal, then veterans (of any era and any branch) share short, first-person stories—funny, tough, surprising, and often unforgettable. You don’t have to be a veteran to attend. And you don’t have to speak to belong. Some people come to tell a story they’ve carried for years; others come because they want to understand what service really means beyond the headlines.
Whether you’re a veteran, related to one, or simply grateful and curious, this is a morning to be in the same room together—good food, good company, and the kind of storytelling that sticks with you long after the plates are cleared.
RSVP by calling 412-623-9029 or emailing JoAnn@veteransbreakfastclub.org. Please make sure to RSVP for events at least two days in advance.
Millions of viewers know NCIS as one of television’s most successful dramas. But what is the real Naval Criminal Investigative Service—and how closely does the show reflect it?
Join the Veterans Breakfast Club for a fascinating conversation with Leon Carroll Jr., Marine veteran, retired NCIS Special Agent, bestselling author, and the longtime technical advisor to the hit CBS series NCIS. After serving in the U.S. Marine Corps, Carroll spent more than twenty years investigating crimes involving the Navy and Marine Corps before helping bring the world of military criminal investigations to television audiences around the globe.
Leon will share stories from his career, explain what NCIS agents actually do, and pull back the curtain on more than two decades behind the scenes of one of America’s most enduring TV shows. How much of NCIS is real? Which details matter most? What does Hollywood get right—and what can never quite capture the reality of military investigations?
We’ll also discuss Carroll’s work as co-author, with actor Mark Harmon, of the bestselling books Ghosts of Honolulu and Ghosts of Sicily, which uncover remarkable true stories of Naval Intelligence, espionage, and World War II.
Whether you’re a veteran, an NCIS fan, a military history enthusiast, or simply curious about the intersection of military service, criminal investigation, and popular culture, this promises to be an engaging evening of stories and conversation.
Bring your questions—and join us live.
