215: Treating Traumatic Brain Injuries at Intrepid Spirit Centers with David Winters

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This is episode 215. 215. Today's guest is David Winters. He serves as president of the Intrepid Fallen Heroes Fund, a leading national organization supporting the military community. Since 2000, this fund has raised over $200 million for families of military personnel lost in Iraq and Afghanistan and for several special purpose projects serving wounded military personnel. He oversees the fund's strategic planning, fundraising and program execution. He has been with the fund since its establishment in 2000 and became president in 2011. He also serves as Executive Vice President of the Intrepid Sea, Air and Space Museum in New York City. And if you haven't visited, you've got to get there. It's just fantastic. His involvement in supporting America's military community began in March 1991 when he helped establish a volunteer charitable effort called Operation Support. And he talks about that some in our podcast here, which in just three short months raised over a quarter million dollars to benefit the families of American military personnel lost in Operation Desert Shield and Desert Storm, our first war in the desert. Winters holds a BA Degree from Fordham University and he and his wife live in New York City where she is Assistant Commissioner for Budget and Revenue for the New York City Police Department. So this spans, you know, interest probably to all first responders and military members and anyone interested in our history in helping out those that are wounded in battle and that are still dealing with this when they come home. Please help me in joining Mr. David Winters.

Well, heroic investors, welcome back. And thank you for joining us one more time. I have with me today Mr. David Winters. And David has a great story, a great history. He has been with the Intrepid foundation and anyone who has not had the opportunity to see that amazing display, the Military museum in the Hudson Canal. Yes, Hudson's the right one. I think we got it right on the, you know, in the New York harbor. Beautiful New York harbor. The aircraft carrier there. Right. The Intrepid. And then there's a submarine and there's all kinds of aircraft and lots of other amazing things. It's a great thing to visit. It really is awesome. Kind of an iconic moment when you're in, you know, New York City there on the south side of Manhattan. So he's been there many years with this organization, has a great story about how he got there that I hope we dig into. He's also with.

An organization called the Fallen Heroes foundation, and we want to talk quite a bit about that. One of my previous guests, Lance, that I mentioned in the introduction also contributed to this, and we kind of dug down into it and it was the thing that led to me meeting the awesome Mr. David Winters. David, thank you so much for joining us on Heroic Investing.

I appreciate being with you and thank you for the time and thank you for your service to our nation.

I appreciate that as well, sir. So. So as we were talking, you've been with Intrepid. You know, you go back to. Basically we started the same time I started my Navy career as an ensign the same time you started with the Intrepid Foundation. I didn't know it was around that long. And it's pretty awesome story. Can you lead us a little bit into not just your background, but also how the Intrepid foundation came around?

Sure. It's really a story of a really wonderful American, the late Zachary. He founded the Intrepid Sierra and Space Museum in New York. He founded a number of other military themed nonprofits, the Fisher House foundation, that many of your viewers may be familiar with. And.

He inspired what is now the Intrepid Fallen Heroes Fund, which we'll talk about. He passed away in 1999, but he was a successful real estate developer here in New York and became very, very successful. But when he was a young man, 16 years old, he was in a construction accident and he had a bad leg and limp the rest of his life for that reason. He was 4 after World War II. He could not serve in World War II because of that injury. But friends, family all went over to serve. He wanted to Serve. But because he couldn't, he always felt a debt to those who went and fought for our nation. Later in life, his family business became much, much more successful. He became very wealthy. And he turned that wealth to paying back the men and women of our armed forces, veterans and their families. And he established these wonderful organizations again, the Intrepid Sierra and Space Museum in New York City to be sort of a monument to the men and women who have served and to teach future generations about that service. The Intrepid herself, it's a World War II aircraft carrier which is now the centerpiece of the museum. 1950s nuclear missile, submarine, grounder, British Airways Concorde, and as you mentioned, a host of really fascinating aircrafts. That's a wonderful legacy. That museum opened in 1982 and still going strong today. Fisher House foundation provides comfort homes for families of military personnel and veterans who are hospitalized. So the families can go and stay near their loved ones who are hospitalized at no cost. They stay in the Fisher House. And it's house. It's like a home. It's a really, really wonderful effort. There are over 80 of those all over the country at military hospitals and VA hospitals and even a couple overseas as well. And the Intrepid Fallen Heroes Fund, which I have the honor of serving as president. That Organization started in 2000 after Zachary Fisher passed away. And today the Intrepid Form Heroes Fund is leading the fight against traumatic brain injury suffered by military personnel. We're doing that by building a series of what we call intensive Intrepid Spirit centers. We're building 10 of these at military bases around the country. And at these centers, military personnel who are suffering from traumatic brain injury can go and get treatments. Seven of those centers are actually already open and operated. They've proven very, very successful. An eighth is under construction and we need to raise money for the remaining two. So I certainly want to ask your. That are helping us in that mission.

Yeah, absolutely. And so I'm tell us real quick before we get to the, you know, go to the all the way to the end and forget to ask the question. The best places to find out more information about the fund.

Our website is fallingheroesfund.org we're also on all social media. We post out there frequently. So we ask, you know, please follow us. Also, our Phone number is 800.

So you can call us. You can go to our website. Follow us on social media. All the information is there.

That's awesome. Thanks. Thanks, David. So now you joined the Intrepid Museum right at the beginning. Right so back in the early, like 1991, 92, at the beginning of Desert.

Shield, you were saying.

Yeah, in brief, I became involved. I was working. Not related to the Intrepid, not related to, to the military at all. But as you recall, around that time, 1991, America became involved in a substantial but brief conflict. Operation Iraqi, Operation Desert Storm. I'm confused.

Yeah, same place, wrong time.

Yeah, but you remember, this is. Operation Desert Shield was the buildup for this operation. And Operation Desert Shield was a military operation. And just for your viewers, I'm sure many of them recall, but this was when Iraq invaded the neighboring country of Kuwait and took it over. And then the United States and a coalition of nations, a huge coalition of nations essentially fought back, liberated Kuwait, and pushed Iraqi forces back to their border. It was a huge, overwhelming military victory.

But it was such a proud moment for America. Norm Schwarzkopf, right? General Norman Schwarzkopf. Norman.

Norman, right.

And he spoke at our graduation at the Naval Academy, the first army officer to, to speak at the Naval Academy at a commencement. And we were so excited. Like, you know, we wanted Ronald Reagan, I guess, but, you know, that wasn't in the cards, of course. But Norman Schwarzkopf, we couldn't have chosen anything better. We were super excited.

No, absolutely. Yeah. He was a superstar back then. I remember it was his plan that executed a pretty overwhelming military victory.

So that was the era that you started actually helping raise money for people with injuries in that, in that war. Right. And then for a period of time after.

Yeah, correct. And just in brief, I didn't serve in the military. I wasn't involved in the military at all at that time. I was working my own job. But a couple friends and I got together and said, although this Operation Desert Storm was a huge military victory, over 300Americans lost their lives in that conflict. And that's a small number on the scale of the military campaign, but it's a large number for those 300 plus families. They lost something. Lost a father, a mother, a son or a daughter. And we said, let's. We didn't do anything for this great military victory. Maybe we can do something for them. So we formed a little organization which we called Operation Support. And we did a fundraising event here in New York and raised over $250,000 for those families.

Wow.

And one of the people who supported that effort was the late Zachary Fisher, who we just talked about, who founded the Intrepid Museum and inspired the Intrepid fallen hero fighting. He got in touch with our group afterwards and said why don't you come help with my efforts? And that's how I became involved with the Intrepid Museum and ultimately the Intrepid Fallen Heroes Fund.

It is just that there's so many great lessons there. I mean, you never know what the ripples that you cause turn into. Right. I mean, your 250,000, I'm sure, was extremely, extremely.

You know, people were very thankful to have received that money that needed it for their family at that moment. The difference that it made, though, in that one effort and meeting Mr. Fisher just is huge.

Even more important was the message that not only do we want to provide financial support, but America will not forget you. You who lost somebody, whoever it was, a relative, a father, mother, you know, our country loves you. Our country will never forget you. So as much as the money we hope helped those families, it's allowing them to know that America cared about them. That was a really, really important message for us.

Yeah. And equally important is making is raising the awareness of things that In World War II, we used to call battle fatigue. Like there's something wrong with this person. Right. And we didn't. We didn't want to recognize. We kind of hid this whole thing about post traumatic stress and brain trauma. We didn't even understand brain trauma at the time. But then after years of understanding it, we still kind of tried to hide both of those concerns. So just the fact that you are raising awareness of this, it's an awesome website, by the way, and it has incredible great information on it. I've spent a lot of time there.

And, you know, so raising information there, but also getting that support to people right where they work every day is fantastic. Would you share just, you know, how did you choose the 10 locations? Was it just the locations of highest need or kind of military centric areas?

Right. When our organization decided to take on this project, we've done several projects before this, but when we decided to take on traumatic brain injury, we did it in cooperation with the leadership of the Department of Defense. We went to them and said, we have the capability to help. What help is needed. And prior to that, we had helped provide some financial support to the families who had been lost in Afghanistan and Iraq. In 2005, the government substantially increased the benefits provided those families. So then we turned to helping the wounded. We went to DOD and said, how can we help? And because of advances in military medicine, a much higher percentage of military personnel who are injured in combat are surviving, which is a wonderful thing, but they're also surviving with these horrendous injuries. All the roadside bombs you remember reading, you know this. And I'm sure your viewers remember all the news articles and news about vehicles get hit by roadside bombs and soldiers get burned and you get loose limbs and amputation. But those soldiers are able to survive, but they're suffering from these injuries. So we built a purpose built advanced physical rehabilitation facility down at Brook Army Medical center in San Antonio that's called the Central Heat Rapid. It opened in 2007. It was a $55 million facility. We raised money all from donations from the American public. And that facility is to this day providing great care for service members with severe burns, with amputation injuries, some multiple amputation injuries, limb salvage where we can actually, we, I mean the wonderful doctors and clinicians and technicians there can save limbs that might otherwise happen. So that's a wonderful facility that opened again in 2007. Once that was done, we went back to DOD, said, DOD and said, hey, that was a, you know, we did this together. Once we built it, we turned it over to the Department of Defense for operation. So it's a partnership. We're not operating and I'm not a doctor, but we know how to raise the funds, we know how to build. So we did that. Then around 2007, 2008, that's around the time where, just as you were saying, traumatic brain injury and post traumatic stress were really becoming very, very well known, we're having soldiers who are suffering these injuries. And the difficult thing with these brain injuries, especially post traumatic stress and traumatic brain injury, is a service member often might not even know he has this injury. You might get a concussion injury, you might get a shockwave from an explosion that you're near. You don't have any physical wounds, you're not bleeding, you don't have any broken bones, but you've been injured. And it's a brain injury. And the brain is a complex organ and it's extremely difficult to diagnose these injuries. But you might start having all sorts of terrible effects. You suddenly can't concentrate, you're losing your memory, your behavior might change, you might get short tempered, you may have encountered this in your own time.

And the tragedy of it is that if these injuries, if traumatic brain injury isn't treated, these effects, they don't just stop. It doesn't cure itself. It needs to be treated. So I've talked to service members who have come close to being discharged because their personality has changed and they're not able to do their jobs anymore. Families can fall apart because suddenly you're yelling at your wife over some trivial thing. If I can, I'll give you a specific example. A good friend of mine named Steve Taylor was, he's a retired navigate, but was a major in the United States Marine Corps. So he's not, you know, that's a senior position of leadership. He suffered a traumatic brain injury, didn't know it. He rotated back home and his wife found him having some of these symptoms I was telling him about. He was forgetting things, he wasn't concentrating, he wasn't retired. He was still working in a Marine but back stateside. And he would find himself losing concentrate. What am I working on? What am I doing? And he started getting short at home. And then one day he found himself screaming, screaming at his wife over a pizza cup. And out of the corner of his eye he saw his little then 3 year old son kind of cowering in the corner, covering his ears because daddy was yelling so violently and mocked and that wasn't his way. So that made Steve realize, hey, something's wrong. And he was able to start seeking out somehow. So the point is that, I mean these injuries are, they're terrible. And in fact, DoD has diagnosed over 400,000 service members with some degree of traumatic brain injury since 2000. So there's a huge need and it has to be provided. So we went to DOD and said, how can we help? So we designed and built a special facility specifically designed for treating traumatic brain injury post traumatic stress that's called the National Intrepid center of Excellence. It's at the Walter Reed national military medical center, $60 million facility. Again, just like the earlier one. We raised all that money from donations to the American public and built that center that opened in 2010. And after that we got to our current project. We're now building 10 essentially satellites to that central facility and military bases around the country. You asked about how we chose locations. Again, we went back to Department of Defense leadership and said, where do we need these facilities? You guys are the experts. We could choose the biggest bases, but. But they determined large bases with large populations with heavy deployment. That's mostly where these men and women are deploying at. They come back and that's where they're living and working now. And we want to get them that care at home. So that's what we're doing and that's the care we're providing.

Well, I appreciate you taking some time to go a little bit further into the history. I did want to cover the San Antonio facility and there at Walter Reed. Say again the name of the one down in San Antonio, the burn center.

That'S called the center for the Intrepid. And again, that's the advanced physical rehab facility.

Right, right. Not just burns, but advanced physical rehab. Okay, wonderful. So there's, you know, a lot of our current efforts and what we think of when we think of.

Catastrophically wounded warriors comes from the 911 contribution. Right. And because we've been at war for so long, since then, and the face of being able, as you said, of being able to keep people alive, thankfully, with larger injuries, is just. There's just a lot of that wrapped around the battle, the war we've been in since 2011. And again, you know, back in the desert again there. But it also had a huge impact on New York City, obviously. Right. And so there's other major things that happen. I've participated a few times with the Tunnel to Towers race, which is also helping, you know, catastrophically wounded warriors. Is. Is there any. And Gary Sinise, you know, obviously has. Has a tremendous thing where he's donating homes and things. And so is there. Is there synergy here or are, you know, you're all working towards the same goals, obviously, at least working at the same kinds of things. Are you working with other organizations or is that just not needed to be able for everybody to achieve their own?

I certainly know a lot of those organizations. Garrison east, actually, for a time was involved in the Entrepreneur Museum on the Florida Museum, which is great. And he's a wonderful. He's a wonderful individual and driven, really. He doesn't just talk the talk, he walks the walk. You know, use the cliche. So he's one. Tunnel for Towers is a wonderful organization. I'm familiar with that. As you said, we are working towards the same goal. Our organization is a little bit different. I don't mean this in better or worse. It's just our operation is different because we're building facilities. Other organizations are providing, kind of. They'll provide like a program to help this particular soldier on this particular day or that Marine or that sailor. We're building facilities which it's a capital program as opposed to. So it's a little bit different. The effect is the same because as we build these centers, once they're open, and as I mentioned before, again, once we build each one and open it, we turn it over to Department of Transfer Operation. Then it helps, then it help, then it helps solicitors. So it's. We're a capital program as opposed to a programmatic effort. But, you know, we're all, again, helping. Yeah, that's a very good.

That's a very good distinction. When I was at the Naval Academy, we were looking into some public private venture facilities there, and that's really. I guess that's really what this is. Right.

So when you.

When you build a facility, obviously the DoD is taking it over. It's on their base, so. So they're involved from day one on the construction and the design.

It's a partnership. We build our leadership again, Zachary Fisher, his nephew, Arnold Fisher, is our honorary Charman. He's a builder. He's built skyscrapers here in New York. So he knows how to build and he knows how to get things done.

On time, on or under budget. Because we don't want to have.

We don't want to have delays. We don't want to have unexpected things happen. He's a bulldog of a man.

Because you don't want to delay. Because every day you delay, that's one more day that some service member is not getting the care he or she needs.

And it's money that you could be spending on the next one, right?

Absolutely. You mentioned something very interesting. You said we've been at war for a long time, and we have, when you think about it, 18, 19 years now, 18 years since 2001. And as I mentioned, all the funds for building these intrepid spirit centers for helping back brain injury, that all comes from donations from the general public. We don't take government funds for building. It's all donations to the American public. And when you think about it, after 18 years, the American public is still reaching into their pocket to give to organizations like ours. And I think that says something really, really special about our nation. People still care. Again, even after 18 years of wars in Syria and Iraq and Afghanistan, whatever else, they still care enough about those who have served our nation to reach into their own pocket and give beyond their taxes, beyond whatever else they do to give to organizations like ours. I think that's a wonderful blessing, and it says something really, really nice about America.

I agree with you, and I really appreciate you having said that. It's one of the most inspiring things I've ever seen. I worked for people. I was not in the military, obviously, when we were in the early 70s and service members were being treated so poorly. There was a point behind that. It wasn't just ugly people coming out at the wrong time. I mean, they were trying to do what they thought was best for our country to get us out of something that, in their belief, we weren't supposed to be. In one way, those people are patriots. I know there's a lot of people who hold a lot of animosity towards them, and I can't judge because I wasn't there. But I did work for people who were in the military then, and it was a place where, you know, members of the military were heavily into drugs and they were not loved when they came home. And, you know, it was just. It was not a place to exist. I spent, you know, all 18 years. Well, okay, 16 of those 18 years of this amazing support from our public in the military, not getting shot at most of the time. And. And it was just incredible. It meant all the difference. All of you out there that are listening and are still supporting like that. It meant all the difference because it allowed us to continue to attract the best, most talented young men and women who can do something that they would be proud of. And so I'm getting all choked up here, but it was amazing. I hope it never stops. I'm not a huge nationalist. I think our flag's not any better than anybody else's flag. So, so to speak. There's people who love their moms and dads and want the best for their families in other countries. It's not just about the American flag to me, but it's about doing what's right. And I feel like our country in most cases does that. It is good against evil in most cases. So I didn't mean to go down that path. I really appreciate you bringing that up, though, David. So, awesome museum, incredible fund. We know how to find the fund. So let's say somebody's visiting New York.

What would you recommend in a day at Intrepid or a day just in the area there?

Well, of course, if you're visiting New York, you must come to see the Intrepid Sierra and Space Museum. That's a must. Again, it's based on a World War II era aircraft carrier. By the way, Intrepid also served in Vietnam, and we have a number of former crew members who I interact with all the time, who, again, just like the men you worked with for, you were talking about just before. So I know a lot of Vietnam veterans, and I understand a lot about what you were talking about as well, about how they were treated at that area at that time. But if you're visiting New York, come over to the Intrepid Museum. We're on the west side of Manhattan, West 46th street and 12th Avenue, right on the Hudson River. Open every day except Thanksgiving and Christmas. So I definitely, definitely would encourage somebody to come over, spend a couple hours here, and then, you know, certainly go down to ground zero in New York and spend some time reflecting, because that would be very. For anybody.

Yeah, there's a time. It's a Fleet Week, I think, right? That is a pretty impressive time there.

Yeah, that's right around Memorial Day. It's essentially Memorial Day weekend every year. That's a wonderful time. Fleet Week is when vessels from the Navy and the Coast Guard and Marines come up and usually several foreign nations that are. Or allied nations, I should say, come into New York harbor, and those vessels are open to the public as well. In the Trapped Museum, we have all sorts of fun, exciting extra programming, much of it on our pier, which is free and open to the public during that time. So Memorial Day weekend, if you're in New York, especially now, we can come over and visit. We also have a very, very special moving Memorial Day ceremony every year on that date to honor those who have given their lives for our nation. So that's something very, very important that we do here.

David, can I ask you to do that again? Because that stupid phone ringing thing has happened in the background. I don't think I can edit it out. Okay, so let me just. So, David, there's also a. Let me just. So, David, there's also an impressive time called Fleet Week in New York. Talk a little bit about that.

Yeah, Fleet Week is a lot of fun. Fleet Week is around. It's on Memorial Day weekend every year, and the U.S. navy and U.S. coast Guard send a number of ships up to New York harbor, and the ships come in and are here, and the sailors and Coast Guardsmen, women and Marines come out and get to visit New York. Likewise, New Yorkers and visitors to New York get to come and go visit these Navy and Coast Guard ships. And there's usually several ships from allied nations as well. Canada is here almost every year, and other nations as well. And it's a fun time. We have a whole lot of activities, very, very special activities here at the Entrepreneur Museum during that time, especially on our pier. The pier of the museum is actually. The pier of the museum is located open free to the public, so the public can come out of the pier. But also, obviously, we encourage people to come into the museum as well. But Fleetwick is an absolutely, absolutely amazing and fun time.

Yeah, it's amazing. It's. It's almost like this museum comes to life with all these member men and women in uniform walking around it. So it's just really inspiring. If you ever get a chance. I mean, Fleet week in any major, major metropolitan area is pretty cool, but in New York City, it's amazing. David, thank you so much. Our time flew by, my friend. And I can't wait to get up there with my submarine veterans group that USSVI that I have, I'm a member of down here in Wall Township. So we will definitely get up there this year, check out the submarine, make sure you got her nice and clean for us.

Thanks so much. David, any parting words?

Again, if I may? Please. I encourage your viewers to visit fallenheroesfund.org, follow us on social media. That will tell you all about our efforts and how to support. We do need support. We have two more of these centers to build. They cost about $12 million each build, so we need the help to get them to this. The sooner we raise that money, the sooner we can build. And Gary, thank you so much for allowing me time to share time with you and your viewers. And again, I thank you for your service.

It's an honor to talk to you.

It was a pleasure. Thank you so much, sir.

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