DOWAGIAC — An Army National Guard recruiter is returning to his roots.

Sergeant First Class Jason Brautigam is returning to Dowagiac as a recruiter after previously serving the area from 2008 to 2012. He is working alongside Sergeant Cody Williams, a 2013 Dowagiac Union High School graduate and a fellow Recruiting and Retention NCO.

Brautigam enlisted in 1989 as a junior at Paw Paw High School with the Army Reserves. He stayed in the reserves for 17 years. Then he was mobilized in Fort Benning, Georgia with an army reserve drill sergeant unit. While in Georgia, Brautigam was introduced to the National Guard.

“Back in the day I wanted nothing to do with the National Guard,” he said. All I heard from a family member was that they didn’t do anything because they didn’t have any money.”

Years later, Brautigam started talking to the National Guard liaisons and found out more about how the National Guard had evolved and caught up with the rest of the branches of service.

“Now, the National Guard has the same money and allocations as all the part-time branches have coming from federal dollars,” he said. “They are all identical.”

Brautigam ended up switching to the National Guard, in part because he worked in their office as an Army Reserve.

He moved back to Dowagiac in 2008 and started recruiting local men and women, ages 17- to 35-year-olds, to serve the country on a part-time basis. He spent four and a half years making connections and building friendships. In 2012, he received the opportunity to work in a unit at Fort Custer Training Center for a year and half, but he missed recruiting. He returned to Kalamazoo and began recruiting in his hometown of Paw Paw for four and a half years. Before his move back to Dowagiac this year, Brautigam worked at the Military Entrance Process Station in Detroit.

“That is where all the branches of the military go to test physical and enlist,” he said.

Through his role as a Recruiting and Retention NCO, Brautigam’s main focus is putting people in boots and also acting as a liaison within the community.

“We are the ones walking around the community in our uniforms, talking and letting people know we are here,” he said. “From time to time we get to do a few community events and help out with a few things.”

Regardless of if anyone enlists, Brautigam said his favorite part of recruiting is the relationships. As a recruiter since 2008, he has developed friendships throughout the area. Much of his time is spent visiting schools, where he will receive hugs from teachers, guidance counselors, principals and superintendents because of those relationships.

“Recruiting does get a bad name and there are recruiters from time to time that do the wrong things,” he said. “The time I’ve been here, I’ve been trying to mold the public opinion of what recruiters really are. All my schools are happy to have me back.”

Oftentimes during lunchroom visits, Brautigam said he does not speak with many high schoolers because their buddies are around.

“Today’s young men and women from years ago have changed,” he said. I think there is less patriotism than their used to be. Students will brag about their heroes in sports and they may have patriotism, but they just don’t brag about it.”

When Brautigam is recruiting, he begins showing the possible enlistee a presentation from start to finish with the good and bad. He prefers that the person interested, no matter their age, bring somebody along with them, because the individual might not think of all the right questions to ask.

“I look at it this way: when it comes to recruiting, people don’t know what they don’t know,” he said. “If the only information they ever get is what they see from TV, movies or somebody who served years ago or what’s on the internet, then they don’t know what they don’t know.”

Brautigam said anyone interested in recruiting needs to sit down with an actual recruiter to get the information. He tells young people that the number one reason to join the National Guard is because of college.

“We are the second-largest branch of the military behind the active-duty Army,” he said. “Lots of opportunities and options.”

He added those who join the National Guard to serve part-time can get both federal and state benefits.

Overall, Brautigam is happy to be back in an office at the Dowagiac Armory.

“I’ve always claimed this as home. Even during my first tour of recruiting, when I had Dowagiac, but I didn’t have Paw Paw, I still called this home. We are here because we want to be here,” he said, motioning to Williams, his new office mate.