Board Members
John B. and Sandy Gately, on the Board of Directors since 2007, have been married for over 30 years, live in Hampton, Virginia and have two grown children, John G and Joy. John and Sandy met in church - Menlo Park Presbyterian Church in California - when he was a Stanford University graduate student studying philosophy, and she was working in the personnel office of a Silicon-Valley high tech firm.
Their first home was the U.S. Military Academy at West Point, New York, where John taught English and philosophy for three years and their son was born. John's military police assignments, thereafter, included Germany (daughter Joy was born in Nuremberg) and Fort McClellan, Alabama. In Germany, John was responsible for customs and black-market investigations throughout Bavaria and was later the European Theater Enemy Prisoner of War Plans Officer. In Alabama, John was Secretary/Regimental Adjutant for the US Army Military Police School/Regiment when given the opportunity to become a public affairs officer and to train-with-industry in marketing and advertising. John and Sandy then went Detroit, Michigan where John "learned the ropes" at Dodge Car and Truck at Chrysler World Headquarters. John’s follow-on assignment was Fort Monroe, where he served as Director of Marketing and Public Affairs for the Army ROTC program nationwide, before retiring in 1994.
Both Sandy and John enjoyed a long affiliation with Fort Monroe's Chapel of the Centurion, the oldest continually used wooden military structure for religious services in the United States, consecrated in 1858. While attending Ft. Monroe's Chapel, John served as President of the Men of the Chapel of the Centurion ("the Men of the MOCC") and taught the adult Sunday School class. Sandy held a number of positions in that chapel's PWOC and the Altar Guild and also serves with the PWOC at Little Creek Joint Expeditionary Base, where many young Navy wives are learning about opportunities for service with PWOC. She has been a Titus II in the Northeast Region of PWOC and a Traveling Trainer. Sandy has taught elementary-school students in both public and private schools. John also serves as Chairman of the Military Affairs Committee of the City of Hampton, Virginia; Co-chairman of the Military Affairs Council, Virginia Peninsula Chamber of Commerce, and is on the Board of Directors of the USO of Hampton Roads and Central Virginia.
John first participated in a major OBI Ukrainian conference in Livov in 2000. John and Sandy put their teaching experience to use when they served at the OBI English Camp in Vorzel, Ukraine, 2007 and in Chernigov in 2010, and they both attended the OBI Women's Conference at Kiev Theological Seminary in 2011.
