“If you don’t have time to do it right, when will you ever have time to do it over?” was the theme 14-year-old Aaron Mankin delivered to his 1997 graduating class of Elmwood Jr. High in Rogers, Arkansas. He had received that advice from his grandfather, a Navy veteran of WWII, and Mankin had chosen to consistently followed it.
Born in 1982 in Fayetteville, Arkansas, Mankin would later become the 1999 Arkansas State Debate Champion at the age of 17. The honor included multiple awards for public speaking and eventually Mankin became the first student in the history of Arkansas high school forensics to qualify for national-level debate competitions. As a senior, his six entries won five first place awards in the Arkansas Association of Instructional Media competition. In 2000, Mankin again applied his grandfather’s advice by graduating with Honors from Rogers High School.
Following graduation, he became the Associate Minister of Student Ministries at a local Baptist church in Rogers. At nineteen, he personally raised funds to travel to China where he engaged in missionary efforts. Among other tasks, Mankin backpacked Bibles into remote villages nestled in the Jade Dragon Mountains along the Yangtze River. In a period of two weeks, he covered a total distance of 55 miles on foot.
At age 20, Mankin began teaching as a substitute in the Bentonville, Arkansas public school district at the elementary and junior high levels. Soon after, he joined the United States Marine Corps. He reported for Boot Camp in San Diego, California at the age of 21.
Upon completion of training in Public Affairs, Mankin’s writings were frequently published in Marine Corps periodicals. In February 2005 he was deployed to Iraq with the II Marine Expeditionary Force. Stationed in Fallujah, Mankin served in Operation Iraqi Freedom as a Combat Correspondent.
In May 2005, Corporal Mankin was assigned to Operation Matador, an eleven-day mission intended to interrupt the flow of militant insurgents along the Syrian border in Northern Iraq. On the seventh day of the campaign, near Ubadi in the Al Qaim province, Corporal Mankin was severely wounded when an IED destroyed his 26-ton AAV fatally wounding six Marines.
He was immediately transported to Brooke Army Medical Center in San Antonio, Texas where he received extensive treatment for wounds received in that attack. While undergoing daily physical therapy.
Mankin has made great progress in his recovery especially after becoming the first patient in ‘Operation Mend’. The sole mission of ‘Operation Mend’ is providing world-class restorative surgical procedures to wounded warriors who have suffered severe disfiguring injuries, and a cooperative venture involving the Katz Family Foundation, UCLA Medical Center and Brooke Army Medical Center
Corporal Mankin has been awarded the Purple Heart and the Navy Achievement Medal with Valor, and has been featured on programs and publications such as CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360 and Lou Dobbs Tonight, ABC World News with Tom Woodruff, Good Morning America, the Hugh Hewitt Show, Paul Harvey News, National Public Radio, Best Life Magazine and others.
Mankin has continued serving as the Patient Media Liaison for the Public Affairs Office at BAMC, however, devotes most of his time to being the proud, single father to children Madeline and Hunter Mankin. He desires to eventually complete his college studies, return to Arkansas, and resume teaching.
“If you don’t have time to do it right, when will you ever have time to do it over?” was the theme 14-year-old Aaron Mankin delivered to his 1997 graduating class of Elmwood Jr. High in Rogers, Arkansas. He had received that advice from his grandfather, a Navy veteran of WWII, and Mankin had chosen to consistently followed it.
