Turbos spooled up boost, knobby off-road tires chewed away at rocky ledges, and ground guides gave commands over handheld radios. But these weren’t military vehicles in some far-off combat zone; they were Ford Broncos right here in the USA.
Blue Star Families, Ford, TAPS, the Travis Manion Foundation and contributions from other veteran advocacy groups created the experience as a pilot for a program to support military and veteran families.
When the organizations teamed to create a community-building, off-road driving experience, the goal was to create real support -- not lip service, a public relations stunt or tax write-offs.
I talked to one of the people behind this initiative to learn how it came to be, what it’s all about and what service members, veterans and their families can expect to get out of it.
Born in the Backcountry
The roots of this budding program go back several years when Jenny Akin, Blue Star Families’ chief of staff, was exploring the Pacific Northwest with her family. Her husband, Cooper, was passionate about conserving the outdoors and sharing the experience with anyone who was willing to put the city lights behind them.
“His whole purpose -- outside of being a Green Beret, which he had wanted to do since he was, like, 12 -- was really to get people outdoors,” Akin told me. “The number of times that he would take just random strangers, link up with them to teach them how to hunt -- I can’t even count it on two hands.”
A string of Fords in the Akins’ family history suggests a second passion.
“He had a Crown Victoria when I met him; he bought a 1988 Ford F-350 farm truck that he tried to fix up, and then we PCS’d across the country and couldn’t take it with us, but his last car was a Ford F-150,” Akin said. “I still have it.”
Cooper died from military-connected, toxic-exposure cancer in 2023.
“I had promised him that I would take the kids to visit all of the national parks,” Akin said. “When he was on his deathbed, I made that promise to him.”
When an opportunity presented itself to serve military families, welcome people into the outdoors and get behind the wheel of Ford’s iconic off-roader, it must have seemed like fate.
“It helped me rediscover a piece of myself and my family that I thought might be gone,” Akin said. “And that was really quite special.”
Providing others with a fun driving experience wasn’t enough, though. Akin wanted to forge a lasting impact beyond smiles and high-fives.
Inside the Bronco Off-Roadeo
The Bronco Off-Roadeo is a program that Ford uses to introduce new Bronco owners and special guests to the vehicle’s prowess in conquering rugged terrain. By partnering with Blue Star Families and other military-focused organizations, the opportunity is now available to service members, spouses, family and friends.
During the event that Akin helped create, people who had never turned a wheel on dirt locked differentials, used clever traction control tricks to pivot around hairpin turns, lofted tires several feet into the air to climb over obstacles, and had a blast doing it.
“It was fantastic therapy to take control where you could but also let go of a little bit of control, which I think is important,” Akin said. “Sometimes, when you’re just coming out of [a] crisis and trying to get your feet back on the ground, it’s realizing where you can and can’t have control.”
For someone who’s never driven off-road, getting paired up with one of Ford’s driving instructors can open a whole new world of opportunity and excitement.
“So empowering!” Akin described it. “I mean, honestly, you get behind the wheel, you’ve got a coach and a spotter, you’ve got somebody on your walkie-talkie kind of walking you through it, telling you exactly what to do, and here’s this thing that I had avoided doing and just let [Cooper] do and happily enjoyed the view, and now I was crawling up mountaintops.”
Akin and Blue Star Families made sure the impact went beyond the driving experience. As anyone in the military community knows, asking for medical care or offering a resume are some of the quickest ways to turn “thank you for your service” into a dial tone.
“This is just a pilot, but, again, we designed it, broadened, trusted and vetted other organizations so it wasn’t all Blue Star Families,” she said. “And then we’re linking [attendees] into additional resources. So we’re kind of pulling them into this whole ecosystem of support now and using that to identify additional needs and push out information.
“The VA had a resource table there. We let Ford know that military spouse employment is still an issue, so they had hiring folks on-site in case there were people who were interested in coming to work for Ford.”
That’s the big takeaway here. Sharing fun experiences with service members, veterans and military families is nice, but putting your money where your mouth is means a whole lot more. Remove barriers to the benefits they’ve earned. Give them a chance when the talent acquisition algorithm spits out their application for not having the right diploma.
“We kind of started thinking about it in terms of, you can have big gestures and simple acts,” Akin said. “And sometimes it’s those simple acts and just taking it a sentence or two beyond ‘Thank you for your service’ that actually lead to some of the greatest impact.”
Start by Contacting the VA Today
If you get a chance to join Blue Star Families at a Bronco Off-Roadeo in the future, jump on it. It’ll be some of the most fun you’ll ever have.
If not, don’t put off taking your health into your own hands. Akin urges every veteran to schedule a PACT Act toxic exposure screening with the Department of Veterans Affairs. It takes only a few minutes and could be tremendously helpful in the future.
Read Next: What to Expect When Filing a PACT Act Claim
Meet Blue Star Families
Unlike a family readiness officer -- who may be great, useless or nonexistent, depending on the duty station -- Blue Star Families provides a network of support that military families can tap into anywhere in the world.
Need advice on packing for a permanent change-of-station, or PCS, move? There’s an online support group for that. Looking for budgeting help? Blue Star Families has the inside track on military discounts. The organization can even help military spouses build their careers and get military kids involved in their new community after moving.
With any luck, you’ll get a chance to take part in a Bronco Off-Roadeo in the near future, too.
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