Jay Martinez

Jay Martinez was born in the fall of 1980 in San Antonio, Texas and grew up in Von Ormy, Texas where he went to Southwest High School. He left Texas in the summer of 1998 and graduated from Dublin High School in Dublin, Georgia in May of 1999. Jay enlisted in the United States Army immediately after high school and graduated from Basic Combat Training at Fort Jackson, South Carolina on September 9, 1999. He then attended Advanced Individual Training to become a Satellite Communications Operator/Maintainer at Fort Gordon, Georgia from September 1999 to June 2000. After training, Jay's first duty station was at Fort Huachuca, Arizona, where he served with Bravo Company, 86th Signal Battalion, 11th Signal Brigade on a Tactical Satellite Communications Team from June 2000 to April 2004. During this time, Jay participated in Operations Enduring Freedom and Iraqi Freedom. He deployed to Kuwait on February 14, 2003 and participated in the U.S. led invasion of Iraq on March 19, 2003. Jay spent his final 4 years in the military as a Satellite Network Controller with Echo Company, 53rd Signal Battalion at Fort Buckner in Okinawa, Japan from May 2004 to July 2008. During this time, he married in May 2006 and his son Jacob was born in September 2007. Upon completion of his military enlistment, Jay was honorably discharged and he and his family returned to Texas in July 2008. In September 2008, Jay and his family moved to Camarillo, California where he worked as a Satellite Operations Center Watch Officer for the U.S. Naval Satellite Operations Center at Point Mugu Naval Air Station. It was here where Jay decided to put down on paper a story about his childhood dogs, Jake and Rascal, so that he could read it to his young son Jacob.

"The Adventures of Jake & Rascal: A New Friend" was published by Eloquent Books in February 2010 and is dedicated to Jay's younger brother Matthew, and of course their childhood dogs Jake & Rascal.

Jay, now divorced, splits his time between Colorado and California, working as a Narrowband Satellite Watch Officer for the U.S. Army Strategic Command in Colorado Springs, Colorado, and volunteering as a project manager for the Sea Save Foundation, a non-profit ocean conservation organization based in Malibu, California.