What I learned was the entire family serves, and when a loved one is wounded, sick or injured, their lives get turned upside down." "I didn't want to run the foundation and be ignorant about for the sake of just running it. "I've never served, so this was something I had to reconcile," Fisher said.
"I love that Fisher House has become so important to me personally and to the families," he said. While his work with the foundation began as a desire to continue a legacy, Fisher said it's now his life. "I think Uncle Zachary knew what he was doing when he sent me there because I immediately got involved in it," he recalled. Taking on the family legacy, the younger Fisher became CEO of the foundation after dedicating a house at Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio. He volunteered to build the first couple of Fisher Houses for military patients and their families. She told the developer and architect that some service members were sleeping in their vehicles because they couldn't afford a hotel during lengthy outpatient care. In 1990, Zachary Fisher got a call from Pauline Trost, wife of the then-chief of naval operations. Ken Fisher, Fisher House Foundation's chairman and CEO, said his uncle, Zachary Fisher, built the first of the Fisher Houses. Dutton expects to return home to Kingsport, Tennessee, when his medical treatment is completed in August. It's the military connections that make it home for us," he said. It's more than just a facility it's also a community. "It provides a little comfort because you're going through the same thing, and being able to support each other is another benefit you wouldn't get in a hotel. The foundation works with DOD's three military surgeons general and the VA to decide where the houses are most needed, based - in large part - on the number of service members and veterans in the area. A Fisher House for service members operates at Fort Campbell on the Kentucky-Tennessee border. It will be the first VA Fisher House in Kentucky. The Lexington house will accommodate 16 veterans and their families in nearly 15,000 square feet of living space. It's the only Fisher House that supports another country's service members. It's a special partnership between the Fisher House Foundation, Helping Our Heroes Foundation and University Hospitals Birmingham Charity. There's also a Fisher House UK at Queen Elizabeth Hospital in Birmingham, England.
The houses provide up to 5,840 nights of lodging, saving veterans and service members more than $640,000 annually, according to the foundation. Located at major military and Department of Veterans Affairs medical facilities, VA Fisher Houses outnumber Defense Department houses 50 to 41.
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