Photo By Aren Everett | Jessica Michael and son, Alec Hammersley, stand inside Navy Recruiting Station...... read more read more
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Alec Hammersley, a Future Sailor in the Delayed Entry Program of Navy Recruiting Station (NRS) Waukesha in Waukesha, Wis., is about to join his brother and sister in the United States Navy and his mother, Jessica Michael, couldn’t be prouder to send a third child to serve.
Michael said she attempted to join the Navy years ago but was unable to finish boot camp due to medical issues. Once she became a mother, though, she always made sure to let her children know that the Armed Forces were an option. When her daughter, Kimberly Hammersley, expressed uncertainty about what she wanted to do with her life, Michael encouraged her to consider service.
“She like the thought of it and decided to talk to the Navy since I was in the Navy,” said Michael. “After talking to the recruiters and hearing about what she could be involved in, the idea grew on her. She said she wanted to finish what I couldn’t. It kind of made me tear up.”
Michael said that her son, Brian Hammersley, also struggled with the direction in which his life was heading.
“Brian put himself through college to earn a degree in criminal justice and had been trying to get a job as a police officer locally, but he couldn’t get in,” said Michael. “Eventually it lost its appeal, and he found a new love in the electrical field. He saw what Kim was doing and the opportunities that were open for her, and he came in and talked with recruiters. I have never seen a kid so determined; I think he sees it as a possible future, not just a job.”
Alec said that while he was proud of his brother and sister, he didn’t know if he wanted to join the Navy initially until his friend, a current Navy Sailor, came back to visit.
“It’s big commitment and I have decent life going on right now, but my friend comes back to visit every few months and is like, hey, go talk to the Navy,” said Alec. “At one point I went to Virginia with him, and I was able to visit the base and see one of the ships up close and it seemed pretty interesting.”
Alec said that after he returned from that visit, he entered the recruiting office and signed up that day.
“If I stay, I’ll be working at the same job for the next 40 to 60 years and that doesn’t sound like fun, so, why not?” laughed Alec. “The Navy sounds like more fun that what I had planned.”
Michael and Alec both say that everyone in the community is incredibly proud of the three siblings.
“The day I went in to work and told my boss I joined the Navy, he spread the news to everyone,” said Alec. “They all told me congratulations; it was nice.”
Kimberly is currently an E-2 training to be a Sonar Technician in San Diego, Brian is in boot camp at Recruit Training Command, Great Lakes, and Alec is scheduled to depart for boot camp in May.
NRS Waukesha is part of Navy Talent Acquisition Group (NTAG) Great Lakes, which is responsible for the Navy’s enlisted and officer recruiting in the northeastern Illinois, northwestern Indiana, Wisconsin, and the Upper Michigan Peninsula. It consists of a command headquarters and two Talent Acquisition Onboarding Centers (TAOCs) located in Chicago and Milwaukee and is part of Region Central of Navy Recruiting Command.
Navy Recruiting Command consists of a command headquarters, three Navy Recruiting Regions, and 26 Navy Talent Acquisition Groups that serve more than 1,000 recruiting stations across the world. Their combined goal is to attract the highest quality candidates to assure the ongoing success of America’s Navy.
For more news from NTAG Great Lakes, go to https://www.cnrc.navy.mil/pages-nrd/chicago/default.html. Follow NTAG Great Lakes on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/NTAGGreatLakes) and Instagram (@NTAGGreatLakes).
For more news from Commander, Navy Recruiting Command, go to http://www.cnrc.navy.mil. Follow Navy Recruiting on Facebook (www.facebook.com/MyNAVYHR), Twitter (@USNRecruiter) and Instagram (@USNRecruiter).
| Date Taken: | 04.13.2021 |
| Date Posted: | 04.16.2021 10:45 |
| Story ID: | 394045 |
| Location: | WAUKESHA, WISCONSIN, US |
| Web Views: | 201 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, Waukesha Family Sends Three Siblings to Serve, by Aren Everett, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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