Five Questions: Jerry Jacob

Led by a desire to serve his country after Sept. 11, KY3 News anchor Jerry Jacob enlisted in the U.S. Army in 2007 at the age of 41, just after the maximum age for enlistees was raised to 42. Sgt. Jacob returned to KY3 on Feb. 20 after serving five years as a combat medic, completing tours in Haiti, Iraq and Afghanistan.

Answering the Call
“It was just something I wanted to do. Why do you go out for a steak? You just do it. As the time went on, I understood more and more why I wanted to do it, and it was related to my admiration of the people who had done it before me: Ted Williams, Joe Louis, World War II guys who had put their careers on hold and did that kind of stuff. I had good role models and hero-worshipped the right people, I guess. Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, and I was just imitating the people I admired.”

Tours of Duty
“It’s like asking, ‘Which kid do you love the most?’ They are all different. With Iraq and Afghanistan – if you have seen a war movie, you can get a sense of what that’s like. With Haiti, there isn’t anything to prepare you for that at all. It was immediately after [the earthquake]. Three-hundred-thousand dead people, you weren’t going to see that in Iraq or Afghanistan. You weren’t going to see that at Gettysburg. In war movies, you know, the people over here are trying to kill the people over there. It’s a concept that is familiar, albeit weird – 300,000 dead people, there is no movie to prepare you for that one.”

Career Considerations
“People were asking me before I left, ‘What are you going to do when you get back?’ And it was like, ‘Let me get this done first.’ … Once I got out, there were a variety of opportunities for me to do whatever. I had done journalism for 20 years, and I wanted to pursue other career fields just because I felt I owed it to myself. I limited my service to five years because of a promise I made to my wife. She said, ‘You’re going to like this so much, you’ll be a career dude.’ And I promised her I wouldn’t be, because we were apart the whole time. (A medical career) was the only thing I wasn’t going to do because I did that in the Army. … I had gotten a belly full of that (and) I didn’t want to see the inside of anybody any more.

Ultimately, I came back to KY3 because it’s home, it’s family.”

New Faces in Places
“I’m a pinch hitter. I’m doing sports this weekend. I did politics last night, and I’m a fill-in anchor when Steve (Grant) and Ethan (Forhetz) are gone. (KY3 managers) wanted to hire me back and there wasn’t a position open other than David Catanese’s position. They hadn’t looked to fill it, but then it was like, ‘Oh, Jerry can do that.’ What I am in the process of doing is learning to cover politics at the level that he did. He left pretty big shoes to fill. When you are here every day, you don’t see the little changes, but drop by drop by drop the bucket is filled. The platforms we use now, the online presence, the smart phones, the video is all delivered here very differently than when I left. It feels like I left in the Stone Age and came back in the digital age just five years later. With Springfield, new leaders, new council members, new commissioners, new chief of police – a lot of the faces are in different places.”

Homecoming
“The difference between supporting the troops and being the troops is you know people who lost their lives or lost their limbs doing that stuff. … You don’t worry when there’s not enough foam on your latte, let’s put it that way. Your perspective is 180 degrees- changed. Having lunch today with my wife, you don’t overlook those things. And hopefully, it will stick with me for a while, but everything is better. Taco Bell tastes better. The streets are smooth. … I can stand at the end of a 15-minute line at a grocery store and smile the whole time, whereas most are fretting and complaining or whatever. You come back appreciative.”
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