Nam Knights Westside Draws Motorcyclists to the Cause

For seven of the nine years the Haley House Fund has been in existence the Nam Knight Westside Chapter has held an annual pig roast fundraiser at Winthrop to raise funds for the fund's mission.

"It's gone quite well," said Vietnam veteran Dave Braun, a former honrary mayor of Brandon, who heralded the Haley House Fund formation years ago at a Greater Brandon Chamber of Commerce Event. "We're all proud of doing what we're doing and for who we're doing it for, which are our most injured soldiers, at the James Haley Veterans Hospital. Our focus is on the families and friends of these soldiers, we put them up."

Braun spoke his mind at the seventh annual charity pig roast fundraiser, held April 6 at the Winthrop Pole Barn in Riverview.

"In my view, there are three things necessary for a soldier's rehabiliation," he said. "One, the best doctors and staff. Two, the best facility possible. Number three, and not necessarily in that order, family members at their bedside, and that's where we come in."

Mary Ann Keckler, with the aid of Mary Ellen Harlan and Dr. Steven Scott, founded the Haley House Fund, a charity that houses and supports the families of soldiers cared for at the James A. Haley Veterans' Hospital in Tampa, at 13000 Bruce B. Downs Blvd.

The year was 2004, Keckler said in a 2011 Brandon Patch interview, “and family members were not being accommodated, they were sleeping in their cars, some of them.”

Keckler, a Vietnam veteran herself, learned firsthand of the family's plight when her own son returned home seriously injured.

The trio met with Braun in announcing the group’s formation years ago at the Brandon chamber event.

"We've helped about 1,500 families and we're approaching $1.5 million in donations and gifts since we started," Keckler said at the April 4 fundraiser at Winthrop.

There, Joe "Stache" Mohr, a member of the Nam Knights Westside Chapter, gave high praise both to the fund and to the group that reaches out each year to help.

"Being a Vietnam veteran I couldn't ask for a better brotherhood than with the Nam Knights Westside," he said. Donations raised at the Winthrop event, benefiting both the Haley House Fund and law enforcement charities, he added, "are going to a great cause."

The Haley House Fund works with area hotels to house and feed family members and significant others who come from all over the country to lend support to those who care for their loved ones who come back forever changed from injuries sustained during active duty and training missions.

Billed as “the American military veteran and law enforcement motorcycle club,” the Nam Knights Westside organization notes on its Web site that over the past six years it has been able to contribute more than $61,000 to the Haley House Fund through its annual pig roast charity fundraiser.

“We are supporting veterans and soldiers including those who are among the most injured soldiers of the Afghan and Iraqi wars,” Braun said in a 2011 interview. The injuries, he added, “are some of the more ungodly,” including “brain trauma, head trauma, amputation and and severe burns, where facial features and chests, arms and legs are disfigured."

The focus of the Haley House Fund is to support the soldier’s caregivers.

“We’re having to train these family members [and significant others] to be caregivers for the rest of their lives,” Braun said. “The hospital trains them and we enable them to be housed and transported at no charge."

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RELATED COVERAGE:

• Haley House Fund Benefits From Nam Knights Westside Fundraiser (2011)

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