National Medal of Honor Museum Announces Appointment of New Board Member, Medal of Honor Recipient Colonel Jack Jacobs

The National Medal of Honor Museum Foundation today announced the addition of Medal of Honor recipient Retired U.S. Army Colonel Jack Jacobs to its Board of Directors, effective immediately. Colonel Jacobs will play a leadership role in the creation of a permanent home to honor America’s bravest heroes.
Joe Daniels, CEO of the National Medal of Honor Museum Foundation, said, “Throughout his professional and personal life, Colonel Jacobs has embodied the love of country, leadership qualities and American values that distinguish our Medal of Honor recipients. We look forward to creating a museum experience that inspires this strength of character in all who visit.”
The Congressional Medal of Honor is our nation’s highest military decoration. Since the first medal was presented in 1863, 3,524 Medals of Honor have been awarded.
“It is a great privilege to have Colonel Jacobs join our Board of Directors,” said Peter Stent, Chairman of the National Medal of Honor Museum Foundation. “We are very grateful for his commitment to helping us build a national museum and monument that will pay tribute to the best and bravest who have served our country.”
“I am extremely proud to be part of this important mission,” said Colonel Jacobs.  “We need to build a National Medal of Honor Museum to remind us that bravery and compassion lie deep within all of us and that patriotism is something that can bring us together.”
The National Medal of Honor Museum Foundation recently announced that it has narrowed its national search for its new home to two cities – Denver, Colorado, and Arlington, Texas. The search, launched last October, has the goal of ensuring the newly created museum will have the highest impact on the largest number of people possible.  It will culminate with the final city selection this September.  The Foundation also plans to build the first-ever monument in Washington, D.C., to pay tribute to the 3,505 Medal of Honor recipients.
Background on Colonel Jacobs is below.
Retired U.S. Army Colonel Jack Jacobs was born in Brooklyn, New York. He holds Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees from Rutgers University and entered the U.S. Army in 1966 as a Second Lieutenant through the ROTC program. He served as a platoon leader in the 82nd Airborne Division, executive officer of an infantry battalion in the 7th Infantry Division and commanded the 4th Battalion 10th Infantry in Panama. A member of the faculty of the US Military Academy, Jacobs taught international relations and comparative politics, and he was a member of the faculty of the National War College in Washington, DC.
He was in Vietnam twice, both times as an advisor to Vietnamese infantry battalions, earning three Bronze Stars, two Silver Stars and the Medal of Honor, the nation’s highest combat decoration. Jacobs retired as a Colonel in 1987.
He was a founder and Chief Operating Officer of AutoFinance Group Inc, one of the firms to pioneer the securitization of debt instruments; the firm was subsequently sold to Key Bank. He was a Managing Director of Bankers Trust, where he ran foreign exchange options worldwide and was a partner in the institutional hedge fund business. Jacobs subsequently founded a similar business for Lehman Brothers and retired again in 1995 to pursue investments.
He is a principal of The Fitzroy Group, a firm that specializes in the development of residential real estate in London and invests both for its own account and in joint ventures with other institutions, and he is the Director of Veterans’ Advancement at the New York Film Academy. He serves on a number of charitable boards of directors and is a Director Emeritus of the World War II Museum.
Jacobs holds the Melcher Chair of Humanities and Public Affairs at the US Military Academy and is an on-air analyst for NBC News, where he was a member of the team that produced the 2011 Murrow Award-winning Nightly News segment “Iraq: The Long Way Out.” Colonel Jacobs is also the co-author of the memoir, If Not Now, When?, published by Penguin and winner of the Colby Award. His second work of non-fiction is Basic, was released by St. Martin’s Press in 2012.