Brown is a retired 27-year Air Force veteran

Staff report

STRUTHERS

Jan Brown, former commander of AMVETS Post 44 in Struthers and a retired Air Force senior master sergeant, was elected the first female national commander of AMVETS during the organization’s 75th annual national convention in Louisville, Ky.

AMVETS, formed in 1944, has about 250,000 members nationwide. Brown’s 2019-2020 term begins Sunday.

“I thank my AMVETS family for putting their confidence in me to lead this organization. I promise that I will always represent AMVETS in the very best light,” said Brown, a 27-year veteran who spent 15 years as a recruiter.

Every year, AMVETS commanders take on a veteran-related project in an effort to bring awareness to certain issues and serve veterans across the nation, according to a news release from AMVETS’ national headquarters.

During her term, Brown, of Boardman, said her focus will be on Save a Warrior, an organization located in Newark, Ohio, that provides counseling services in the fields of mental health and wellness and post-traumatic stress to veterans, military personnel, police, firefighters and other first-responders.

“There are parts of ourselves that the traditional medical model is not equipped to heal or nourish, thereby adding to our suffering,” Brown said.

“AMVETS works relentlessly to heal American veterans, and I believe that through this project, we will continue working to see that veterans are living well, not just ‘unsick’, and we’ll begin to curb the national veteran suicide crisis,” she said.

Like every commander before her, Brown will serve one term.

She said she is determined to hit the ground running once she arrives at AMVETS national headquarters in Washington, D.C.

“I’m excited to really work together as an AMVETS family, because that is what we are. That’s how we’re going to continue to grow, if we include our family,” Brown said.

Jan Brown is the second person in the family to be national commander. Her husband, John P. Brown, was AMVETS national commander from Sept. 1, 2007, to Aug. 31, 2008.