South View High School JROTC Teacher receives Presidential Lifetime Achievement Award

HOPE MILLS — Among the awards and certificates hanging on retired Sgt. Maj. Ruby Murray’s walls in her office at South View High School are three reminders — a photo of her father, a poem written by her daughter and a sketch of an angel.

Murray, an instructor for the school’s Junior Reserve Officers' Training Corps program, recently learned she was named a recipient of the 2021 Presidential Lifetime Achievement Award.

Individuals who earn the award dedicate 4,000 hours or more to volunteer service, according to a news release from Cumberland County Schools.

For Murray, the award reflects what others have instilled in her.

Military career

Murray grew up in Virginia.

Her father, Pvt. Vernon Lester Gaskins, suffered "shell shock,'' now known as post-traumatic stress disorder, from his time serving in Vietnam War.

From a young age, Murray knew she wanted to join the military to follow in her father’s footsteps and continue his service.

“The only thing we had to live for on the Eastern Shore was two chicken plants, and I knew that’s not what I wanted to do with my life,” Murray said.

Immediately after graduating from high school in 1989, she enlisted in the Army as a logistics specialist, ensuring ammunition, food and equipment were available for soldiers in the continental U.S. and in deployment zones.

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Murray said her squad leader at her first duty station of Fort Greely, Alaska, helped mold her into a leader by ensuring she took the right leadership courses or encouraging her to volunteer in local communities.

Shortly after being assigned to Fort Bragg in 1993, she received a humanitarian mission assignment to Somalia during the Battle of Mogadishu, known as “Black Hawk Down."

After the 9/11 terrorist attacks, Murray said, most of her Army career was spent at Fort Bragg between deployments to the Middle East.

“I’ll never forget those that we lost,” she said. “We know that ... our job of serving our great country is to never let our guards down.”

She said she thought about her father during each deployment.

“I knew that during that timeframe, I had to stay strong, not just for myself, but also for the soldiers that were around me,” she said.

With each deployment, Murray brought a portrait of an angel with the phrase:“This too, shall pass,” — a mantra she said she often repeated during missile attacks and mortar rounds in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Motherhood

Aside from coping with the anxieties of war, Murray said that one of her biggest challenges during her 26-year Army career was becoming pregnant with her daughter, Jasmine Keaire Murray, in 1998.

Murray said she was concerned about the pressures associated with maintaining Army weight requirements.

After the seventh-month of the pregnancy, she had almost doubled in size, she said.

“I went into anxiety. I went into the fear of losing my job,” she said.

After 45 days of leave, a company commander brought up the weight.

"I had to do something ...not just for my life, but also the future of my daughter who had just come into this world, because I knew that I do not want her to grow up in poverty,” Murray said.

Murray said she went to a gym on McPherson Church Road, where a female trainer encouraged her to look at her daughter's photo to motivate her during workouts.

Not long after passing her own physical fitness test, a sergeant major on Fort Bragg approached Murray about spearheading a postpartum physical fitness pilot program.

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She estimated that over nine years she helped 300 other female soldiers of all ranks through the program.

“I'm grateful to see years later (that) changes have come for the postpartum PT program,” she said.

Just as her daughter inspired her during her Army career, Murray said her daughter also let her know when it was time for her to leave.

“I love my country. I love people, and that’s what kept me serving for so long, but I remember coming out of a 2013 deployment and prior to boarding a plane, my daughter asked me, ‘When will I get mommy time,’” Murray said.

Murray knew she missed key moments in her daughter's life and she wanted to cheer her daughter on as she had dance recitals or sporting events during her high school years.

A poem called “Why “that Jasmine wrote to give her mother during Murray's 2016 retirement ceremony is on display in her school office.

The poem starts with Jasmine saying when she was younger she asked why her mother had to leave so much, missed a birthday in 2012 or why Jasmine was the child of a military mom.

“While other parents were at the dining table talking with their kids, dad and I was on our knees hoping and praying that mom made it back safely from overseas,” Jasmine wrote. “You see, I had the faith of a tiny mustard seed that my mom would come back to me soon. She helped soldiers realize their full potential... God knew what he was doing, so he placed her where she belonged.”

During Jasmine’s time at Pine Forest High School and where Murray was a mentor, an Air Force JROTC instructor told her that JROTC programs needed more women. He encouraged Murray to apply to become an instructor.

“I realized that these kids were once me ... I could always see my track coach, my basketball coach that took this broken vessel and made something out of me, which was when I was hungry, they fed me. When my grades went low, they made sure my grades went high” Murray said.

Murray was named South View High School's Teacher of the Year during the 2017-18 school year.

She said she tells her students the same thing she told her soldiers — that their voice matters, and she will not make decisions without their input.

Volunteering

Murray said she also encourages her students to give back and volunteer.

Though she said she wasn’t keeping track of her own volunteer hours, a Facebook friend noticed she had 1,000 hours before leaving Fort Bragg and that she continued to volunteer after the Army.

Each Christmas, Murray purchases gift cards to give to elderly people in need. She volunteers with another teacher during Thanksgiving to serve meals to the local homeless community.

“I tell my cadets that on Christmas and Thanksgiving if I’m eating ham, I have a problem knowing that some people could be eating Spam,” Murray said.

The friend nominated her for the Presidential Lifetime Achievement Award without Murray’s knowledge. When she received the letter from the White House, Murray said she thought about her father, who died while she was on a 2012 deployment.

"I know he's proud. I've been volunteering all my life and get that from him," she said. "I know he was a giver because even at the (Veterans Affairs) hospital, he'd always ask if I needed money or anything."

Murray said she considers the recognition as part of the values her father and family instilled in her.

Murray, who was also inducted into the Quarter Master Hall of Fame last month, said wants to continue to make an impact in the lives of her cadets and others and celebrate their accomplishments.

Her own daughter graduated with honors and a master’s degree this week, and Murray said she is getting ready to celebrate the upcoming graduation of her ROTC cadets, too.

“I want to see them have opportunities — that's my heartbeat,” she said.

Staff writer Rachael Riley can be reached at rriley@fayobserver.com or 910-486-3528.

This article originally appeared on The Fayetteville Observer: Retired Fort Bragg sergeant major receives presidential award