Jake Wood is a United States Marine Corps Veteran, the co-founder of Team Rubicon, and the author of the book Once a Warrior.
Jake's story starts as a college athlete, playing football at the University of Wisconsin. As college was winding down, he knew that he wanted to serve in the military, but the traditional route college graduates take toward an officer's commission was blocked by obstacles due to his football injuries.
So Jake decided that he was going to enlist. He joined the Marine Corps and became an infantryman, and then eventually, a scout sniper. Jake served multiple deployments to Afghanistan.
When it came time for Jake to get out, he was deciding on whether or not he wanted to pursue his MBA, and then a massive earthquake hit Haiti.
Jake decided that he was going to go down to help with the rebuilding effort. After landing in the Dominican Republic, Jake met up with a number of other American veterans and civilians who were also going down to help with the effort.
He crossed the border of the Dominican Republic into Haiti with them. Along the way, the idea for Team Rubicon was born.
Since then, Jake has built Team Rubicon into a massive volunteer organization that consists of hundreds of thousands of members. He was awarded the Pat Tillman Award for service in 2018, and recently published the book Once A Warrior.
You can find Jake's book here: https://www.amazon.com/Once-Warrior-Veteran-Mission-Closer/dp/0593189353
You can learn more about Team Rubicon here: https://teamrubiconusa.org/?gclid=Cj0KCQiA48j9BRC-ARIsAMQu3WSHN1vKj2WVrj0PjLJDXXe37PopP06N78amLSyRpnW6uEyb_w7AUBkaAkVLEALw_wcB
Feature photo by Kirk Jackson