Iraq Afghanistan Deployment Impact Fund Grant Profile:
Jacob's Light Foundation, Inc.

Once a month, a group of volunteers gathers at the Brentwood American Legion Hall in Bay Shore, NY to pack care packages destined for young men and women serving their country in Iraq and Afghanistan. And while the items may seem mundane — bug wipes and batteries, pillowcases and pencils — those boxes have proved deeply meaningful for all involved.

Many of those hundred or so volunteers who join together on packing day for Jacob’s Light are the parents of enlisted men and women. And the time they take to load thousands of everyday items into those cardboard boxes they call an honor. It’s a way to help them deal with the difficulties of having a child away at war and allows them to offer their support and feel, in some way, connected to the troops.

Receiving those boxes, packed up by loving hands at home, are young men and women often further from home than they’ve ever been in their lives. Jacob’s Light works to specifically identify those troops who don’t receive support from home and offers those care packages as a comfort and connection to the familiar.

And for Dorine Kenney, the force behind Jacob’s Light, each item, each box and each packing day is a reminder of her son, U.S. Army Spc. Jacob Fletcher, who was killed at age 28 by a roadside bomb in Iraq, and who served as the inspiration for her organization.

She sent care packages to him from the beginning of his tour, filled with things he needed and that reminded him of home. He felt bad for friends who weren’t getting anything and asked his mother to share with them as well. She was happy to comply, and never minded the growing requests.

“It really touched my heart,” she says, “that the war didn’t break his spirit. He was the same compassionate man I knew and loved.”

After his death, sending the boxes became her way of coping. She remembers that she sent that first package 11 days after he died, to commemorate his birthday. She hasn’t stopped since.

Jacob’s Light has shipped roughly 125,000 pounds of items since its inception in 2003. Toiletries, photos of children, food and snacks, reading and writing materials, bug wipes, sunscreen, batteries, space blankets, athlete’s foot cream, socks, letters of support, the list goes on and on. And through an abundance of cards and letters and e-mails, Kenney hears firsthand how much those packages have meant.

“You start to read between the lines,” she says. “’That package came just in time, Mrs. Kenney,’ they’ll say. And you’ll know that they were probably down to their rations.”

One commander wrote to say that each box “brings with it a small boost in morale.” A soldier wrote to thank her, saying, “I’ve been here for a few months and I didn’t think I was ever going to get anything.”

The group focuses on those enlisted men and women who either don’t have family support or whose families can’t afford to send anything. They hear from commanders and from the soldiers themselves, who let her know who is deserving of the next package, like the soldier who day after day delivered mail to everyone else, but who never received anything himself. Someone wrote to her about him, and he was sent a letter and a care package of his own.

With a grant of $250,000 from the Iraq Afghanistan Deployment Impact Fund, Kenney says Jacob’s Light will be able to double the number of troops reached, improve the quality of goods purchased, and even save money by buying in bulk. For now she’s working at refining the organization’s systems to accommodate expansion. Eventually, she hopes to move out of the donated storage unit in West Islip into her own building and do her ordering online. In the meantime, Kenney and her volunteers are out doing the shopping themselves, hunting down those special requests that can brighten a soldier’s day.

One of her oddest requests, she recalls, was for pepperoncinis. They were for a young woman who wrote to Kenney telling her how much she missed the pickled peppers. Kenney searched everywhere for some that weren’t packed in glass. But finally, she wrapped some jars in bubble wrap and shipped them off.

“She just had to have them,” she recalled. “She absolutely loved them and they made her so happy.”

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