(upbeat music) - Coming up in the next hour of local news on Arizona PBS on "Arizona Horizon," a Veterans Day special.

We'll hear from a decorated World War II veteran and others.

And on Cronkite news hear about the newest Arizona Veterans Hall of Fame honorees.

That's all ahead in the next hour on Arizona PBS.

- [Announcer] This hour of local news is made possible by contributions from the friends of PBS, members of your PBS station.

Thank you.

- Good evening and welcome to the special Veterans Day edition of Arizona Horizon.

I'm Ted Simons.

We begin tonight with Caitlin Julian, a veteran and a mom, whose son took his own life after his military service.

Caitlin has used her son's story to work to prevent others from taking that path.

She earned her master's degree in mental health wellness with an emphasis on PTSD and combat-related trauma.

We talked to Caitlin Julian about her efforts.

Caitlin, good to have you here.

Welcome to Arizona Horizon.

What does Veterans Day mean to you?

- Veterans Day is a day to honor and honor those who served, all that served, and also for me it has become a date also to remember those who did not make it home or those who we've lost.

- Yeah.

You're a veteran.

- I am.

- What called you to service?

- I enlisted during Desert Shield/Desert Storm.

I think my main motivator was I wanted to see if I could do it, like a personal challenge, and money for school.

I also am third generation Army.

So I think that I always had a respect for the military and a curiosity though, I don't think at any point in my childhood that I think that I actually would go in, but when the time came, I just felt like it was a calling.

- It was a calling for you.

Was it a calling for your son?

- Absolutely.

It was.

- Go ahead, please.

Tell us his story too, as much as you're comfortable telling.

- Okay.

So my son always wanted to be in the military.

He always talked about it and I always was encouraging him to go to school.

I was happy to have him safely registered in GCU.

And he had almost a full academic scholarship and he came to me and said, "We have to have a serious talk."

And I was like okay.

That's kind of nerve-racking.

- Yes, it is.

- So he said, "I wanna join the military.

And I feel like it's my calling."

So what do you do?

I supported him in that decision.

He was initially wanted to go Air Force.

I said, "You are fourth generation Army."

- Yes, you are.

- So I think that's probably the most influence that I had over him.

I encouraged him to go into the National Guard.

He was always interested in the military and always very patriotic, liked the military books, the military movies.

- Yeah.

- Yeah.

- So with that in mind, talk to us about how things changed for your son and how that changed you in terms of what you're focused on, which is mental health, PTSD and those issues.

- Yeah.

So at the time, so my son had probably a lot of trauma.

He was not deployed.

He got in trouble and that kind of spiraled his experience.

- [Ted] Yes.

- So he always was a really good kid, an athlete, super resilient, straight A student, never got in trouble, ever.

And he got in trouble and had to stay home, in the rear is what they call it.

So the first deployment was to Afghanistan and he was left in the rear and he was a combat medic.

So all he wanted to do was go and be in combat.

And I think that a year went by, he went through, took responsibility for his actions, straightened things out.

And the second deployment to Iraq, I think he started to think maybe I messed up my life.

Maybe I'm not going to get to serve the way that I had hoped.

And three days later he died by suicide.

- All right.

That's a tough story.

That's a tough thing to go through.

You have studied this.

You have trained in terms of medical health issues and medical trauma, combat trauma, all of these situations.

His story, is that a familiar story?

- It is a familiar story.

I think there's a lot of misconceptions.

I actually was finishing my masters in mental health and wellness with an emphasis on prevention.

And my focus of study was PTSD and combat-related trauma.

We study all of the prevention topics, but that was the thing that I most was interested in.

And I really was wanting to use that just to serve.

I worked for Cox and I wasn't planning on leaving my job, but I just wanted to serve the veteran community.

I didn't know, at the time, even that the veterans suicide issue was so prominent.

So I think the thing to learn that could be learned from my story or from Stephen's story really is there's a few things is that PTSD has not just come from combat.

- [Ted] Interesting.

- So I think that's a really important takeaway.

Not all of the veterans and active military service members that are dying by suicide have combat experience.

So it is not solely a combat-related problem.

- And we should mention that you've established a couple of scholarships now in Stephen's honor.

- Yeah.

So each year, we pick something to do to honor Stephen.

The first year, we hosted a run, and then the second year, my friends approached me and asked, "What do we wanna do this year?"

So it's really actually a great story about friendship, but it was some of my work friends.

So we just put together this scholarship, it was very...

It was gonna be for a combat medic.

And we did the whole thing, writing the application.

It's actually a lot more work than what I realized, but so we started the scholarships and we raised a lot more money than what we were planning.

And so it is a way to carry on obviously, the story of my son, and to really support a combat medic or corpsman, it's open to all branches of service, could be a veteran or active medic.

And they have to have some characteristics that we would define as representing Stephen.

- Right, right.

Excellent work there.

Last question, before you go.

Now, you got a podcast coming out here.

What's this all about real quickly, if you could.

- Okay.

Yeah, so it's called "Mission to Zero Pod" podcast and it's about just providing resources to would be veterans supporters, policymakers, family members, making sure that people know what resources are available, understand, talk to the experts.

What are the cutting edge, what's cutting edge information about how do we get help?

Because there's a lot of things that are misconceptions, like counseling is critically important, it can be very useful, but it's not the only way.

And so just giving people, empowering them with information and then also uniting the veteran community.

- All right.

Well, Caitlin Julian, thank you so much for sharing your story and Stephen's story, and for doing your son proud and congratulations on getting that podcast going and for all your great work.

Thank you very much.

- Thank you.

- And coming up next, we'll hear from a veteran who experienced homelessness and a is now helping other veterans get back on their feet.

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(light music) - Richard Rubi served in the Marines and after a rough experience in a service and a serious motorcycle accident, he found himself mired in drug use and later became homeless.

But he's now back on his feet, he's living in Yuma and he's helping homeless vets with the same attention that he once received.

Richard Rubi, welcome to "Arizona Horizon."

Good to have you here.

It is Veterans Day.

Tell us your story now.

It's quite a story.

We don't have a heck of a lot of time, but it's a lot going on here, so tell us that story.

- All right.

So I'm originally from Queens, New York.

I joined the Marine Corps in 1996.

I was really excited.

It was a whole new world for me.

I went to bootcamp in Paris Island, South Carolina.

After graduation, I went to A.C.E.

School in Meridian, Mississippi.

And from there, I got stationed in Iwakuni, Japan.

My first duty station had a great talent, met a lot of great people.

From there, I went to a second MOS school in Athens, Georgia, and then I moved on to San Diego.

While I was in San Diego, I deployed to Iraq, Operation Iraqi Freedom.

I did a combat tour out there.

And the reason I was able to do that, even though I am an airway was because I did a individual augment to a unit out in Baghdad.

Had a really good time out there.

Met a lot of great people, seen a lot of crazy things.

Prior to my deployment to Iraq, in 2003, I got into a really bad accident.

I got into a head-on collision.

I was on a motorcycle.

And with that came a lot of different things.

The worst being the opiate painkillers that the Navy had me on for about two years.

Two years later, in 2005, they said we're not giving these to you anymore.

I had some at home still, so I figured no big deal.

I'll just stop taking them.

That's the first night I experienced withdrawals.

And yeah, I didn't know what it was.

I didn't know what was happening to me.

But what I did know is soon as I took another pill, all that went away and the sickness goes away.

So unfortunately, I self-medicated for a pretty long time.

And in 2007, I got orders to Yuma, Arizona.

I was pretty excited and I was really happy.

My mindset was thank God I could get away from this.

I could start a new chapter in my life and get away from these painkillers.

Little did I know in Yuma, Arizona, I was a lot closer and it was a lot easier accessibility to pills that I was looking for.

And once again, I self-medicated.

And in 2009 is when things really fell apart for me.

- And you spiraled downward and you hit bottom.

- [Richard] Yes, I did.

- What got you up?

And how is that lesson important for others?

We're talking homelessness here in veterans, and that's the emphasis here.

What are you telling?

How does your story hit with other veterans?

- So immediately after getting separated from the Marine Corps, I did continue to self-medicate with prescription medication, which got very expensive and that quickly moved from painkillers to heroin.

And now I'm on the other side of the things.

I lost everything.

My girlfriend kicked me out.

I was living in my car for quite a while.

And I see a lot of veterans in that same situation today.

So what ended up happening was that the sad part of everything is that it is easier sometimes to just stay on the street and maintain that way because of all the difficult things that you have to maneuver your way back into regular life, when you decide to come back.

But in 2014, I decided enough was enough.

I just couldn't do it anymore.

I knew that if I continued that way, it was either death or prison.

There was no other way around it.

I decided to clean up my act.

I had to come back to Yuma, Arizona, after a trip to Miami.

I went to spend some time with my father.

He passed away.

And then I came back over here.

I had to serve out some probation.

And with that, I was on the fence.

Either go to prison or successfully complete my probation.

So I did.

And I got connected with a lot of different services.

I started a methadone program.

I started to get clean.

I started to go back to college, and that's when I got introduced to Right Turn for Yuma Veterans, which is a nonprofit out here in Newmar, Arizona.

And that was the beginning of my new life.

I felt fresh and motivated to start doing the right thing.

And when I started making the right choices, all these doors started opening up for me.

And yeah, I ended up getting my psychology degree from my Arizona Western College.

And in 2016, Judy Smith, which is the CEO here at Right Turn for Yuma Veterans, she hired me on the staff.

So I'm still here.

I continue to help out veterans.

We're not trying to reinvent the wheel.

What we do is we connect veterans with the services that already stood up in most cities, whether it be the VA, or any kind of veteran services that they have available in your community.

The veteran community over here is very tight-knit.

We all know each other pretty well, and we all help each other.

- Well, congratulations on your service, what you've done, what you're doing now, especially to help veterans and the homeless veterans and everything that's going on there in Yuma.

And thank you for sharing your story with us.

We really appreciate it.

Thank you, sir.

- Yep.

No problem.

You're welcome.

Thank you.

(upbeat music) - Next on our Veterans Day special, the story of a World War II veteran who served as a bombardier.

Edward Chan flew more than 30 sorites over Europe, while based in Italy.

He flew in a B-24 Liberator, and his job was to align the sites for the 500-pound bombs being dropped from the plane.

Chan was born in San Francisco, but moved to Tucson after the war, where he worked as an inspector for Hughes Aircraft, while raising his family.

At age 98, he is one of several Grand Marshalls for this year's Veterans Day Parade in Phoenix.

We spoke to Edward Chan about his service.

Edward Chan, thank you so much for joining us on our special Veterans Day celebration of Veterans Day.

You were a U of A student one minute and a 20-year-old bombardier over Europe in World War II the next.

How did that happen to Edward Chan?

- Well, I happened to be in the U of A when we decided to go to war during the war year of 1942.

- And you decided to enlist.

Why did you decide to enlist?

- Well, I started to enlist because everybody else was doing it.

And I guess I was one of the ones to do it.

- Yeah, well and not too long after, you were flying sorties over Southern Europe.

Talk to us about being a bombardier.

How you learned, and what it was like being up there.

- Well, it's quite a journey going up there.

I have a record of 32 sorties that I flew that I went to Germany, Yugoslav.

All those countries.

We went to bomb all the bomb sites.

We bombed mostly the water, figuratively speaking.

We bombed most of the airplanes and bombed ball-bearing factories and the factories that build aircraft and stuff like that.

- Yeah, strategical targets.

Did I read that there was in one point, of the bomb bay doors stuck and you had to climb out there and fix it for the plane to land?

- Yeah.

Well, I had a fishtail sitting in the catwalk and trying to fishtail the bomb bay doors to close it so we could fly formation and land the aircraft at a certain spot.

- [Ted] Well, that must have been something.

- And we had a long time, and finally I got hooked up where we could land safely and fly formation at the right time.

- After the war settled down, you settled down in Tucson with the Hughes and Raytheon.

Correct?

- Well, I went to flight school first.

They recorded the records.

The records show that I could fly, could be a bombardier or a pilot, either one.

Then I came home.

And after that I went to Raytheon and Hughes for eight years and I was superintendent of quality control.

- Yeah.

It's a lot of memories, I would imagine, huh?

- Yeah, it's a lot of memories of fighting out of Spinazzola and that is in Italy, and we flew from Italy all the way to Northern Germany.

- Yeah, yeah.

Well, again, we thank you again so much for your service, for certain, and thank you for your time today speaking with us on Veterans Day.

Congratulations, sir and thank you so much for your time.

We really appreciate it.

- Okay, it's been a privilege for me to be able to talk to you about it.

- [Ted] Thank You.

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Watch us online.

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- For veterans finding a job after the military can be tough, especially when readjustment to civilian life can sometimes hinder job performance.

But an organization called Natural Restorations actively seeks out veterans for a special skillset that those from the military possess.

Producer Kylie Cochran and photographer Roger Monroe learn more at the Salt River, where veterans join forces for a river cleanup.

- [Kylie] Veterans go above and beyond for their country.

And now, a number of them go above and beyond for Arizona lands.

As contracted workers at Natural Restorations, veterans have the chance to get their hands dirty and their feet wet, all in the name and the job.

- So we have two different kind of jobs that we do.

One, we do graffiti removal.

So we just started a Facebook page where if people are out and about and they see graffiti, they can take a photo and geotag it.

And we also do trash removal.

- [Kylie] Natural Restorations removes trash and graffiti from recreation and wilderness areas throughout Arizona.

They reach out specifically to veterans like former army medic, Ryan Morin, to do the job.

- And I heard about this job on the radio and I reached out and they needed somebody and I did a week with them at Butcher Jones and I just fell in love with it.

- [Kylie] For the Owner of Natural Restorations, Nicole Corey, it's more than just a working relationship with the veterans.

- It's the best thing that we've done, is to be able to contract them and be around them.

And they just always inspire me to be a better person.

- [Kylie] Especially because veterans bring a unique skillset that serves them well on Natural Restoration projects.

- Just with all the different backgrounds that they come from, they are really good at knowing that everybody is safe, like watching everybody's back.

We're always kind of scanning, making sure everybody's good and safe, and they never quit.

They don't go no, I don't wanna do that.

Or, oh, that looks kind of hard.

These guys know what difficult, challenging work is, and they love being outdoors and working with us.

- [Kylie] For the veterans like Ricky Cobban being here in the weeds feels right.

- When I got into outdoorsmanship and being outside, that was through the military, so it's something that appeals to a lot of people, and especially the veterans that are coming out of combat and looking for something to do that utilizes their skills and what they're good at.

It's something that is an easy transition for people.

It's wild.

You can get into crazy places and have adventures.

- [Kylie] And it's more than just adventures.

It's a brotherhood.

- We have a gentleman who used to load ordinance for the aircraft and he is insanely strong and he is like our mule.

We work with infantry guys and staff who just are so disciplined.

And it just goes back to we pull our own weight and we don't want to be the weak link.

- [Nicole] Honestly, I used to work for companies where we used to have team builders to try to make us like each other.

And with the veterans, all it takes is where'd you serve?

Where have you been?

And it's like an instant brotherhood and friend and family member.

- [Kylie] And the veterans we talk to say they won't miss out on a chance to work with the community.

- [Ricky] So today, this is one of their big cleanups.

They'll get a few hundred volunteers out here, wake up early to an alarm on a Saturday morning to come drag trash out of trees which is pretty awesome that they can get this many people from around the area.

- [Kylie] Besides cleaning up Arizona lands, Corey has one more goal.

- [Nicole] Our goal is to bring more veterans on and expand and eventually expand into other states.

Sadly, we're needed in more than just Arizona.

But our goal is to be able to bring on more veterans and change more vet lives.

(trash thuds) - For more information, the organization's website is Naturalrestorations.org.

That is it for now.

I'm Ted Simons.

Thank you so much for joining us on this special Veterans Day edition of "Arizona Horizon."

You have a great evening.

(upbeat music) Coming up in the next half hour on Arizona PBS on Cronkite News, honoring veterans who continue to give back to their communities.

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