Airman First Class Elizabeth Nicole Jacobson was born March 26th, 1984 in Orlando, Florida. She attended both Palm Beach Gardens and Gold Coast high schools while residing with her grandparents. Over the course of her adolescence, she lived alternately with her grandparents in Florida and her mother in California.
A member of Fresno Playhouse and once-winner of a Poetry.com contest, Jacobson also loved animated shows. She once wrote home, among sentiments that she loved and missed her family, jokingly declaring that she was going to start a family with Spongebob Squarepants, protesting that she did not understand why Ren and Stimpy was cancelled and wished the show would be put back on air, and plainly stating her love of Invader Zim. She also wrote that she wanted to have two sons and name them Hunter and Austin.
Jacobson graduated from an adult education program in Madera, California. She then returned to Riviera Beach, Florida to find employment, ideally in law enforcement.
Influenced by the September 11th attacks and the suggestion of her grandfather, Jacobson chose to join the military and decided on the Air Force. She enlisted in December 2003. When she completed Security Forces technical school, she was assigned to the 17th Security Forces Squadron, Goodfellow Air Base, San Angelo, Texas.
She was an installation entry controller and patrolman who often worked the gate and was known for her ever-present smile and upbeat attitude when greeting those who entered the base. Her favorite quote was “We’re only on earth for a little while, so live life to the fullest and carry a smile.”
Airman First Class Jacobson specifically requested to be deployed when a deployment tasking was assembling a 13-person squad to serve at Camp Bucca, Iraq. She told them, “It’s my time.” At the time, she had guardianship of her 16-year-old sister, which could have exempted her from deployment if she had so chosen.
She was “neither the biggest, nor the strongest [but] definitely the toughest,” according to her Flag Folding speech. She volunteered for jobs other Airmen did not want and was known as an “informal leader.”
Airman First Class Jacobson requested placement on convoy missions “to carry her weight.” Within three months of her deployment, she was placed on the off-base convoy support team, which was “comprised of only the best; those who displayed the utmost courage, skills, and core values,” according to Goodfellow Air Force Base.
On September 28th, 2005, Airman First Class Jacobson was providing convoy security support in Safwan, Iraq, when an improvised explosive device detonated near her convoy vehicle. She was the first woman Airman to be killed in Operation Iraqi Freedom and the first Air Force Security Forces member to be killed in any conflict since the Vietnam war.
Luke Hoch, who served with Airman First Class Jacobson, commented on her obituary, “I still think of you from time to time. It was never the same walking around the dorms and not running into you. You were one of the nicest people I have ever met while in the military. You always had a smile on your face and were always ready to start up a conversation with someone and cheer them up.”
Andrea Cecetka, who served at Goodfellow Air Base with Airman First Class Jacobson, shared, “[Although] I didn’t know her well, I’ll always remember one thing about her. Every morning she was at the gate she greeted me like we were old friends. Sometimes traffic was slower and we’d exchange a few words, but no matter my mood when I got in my car, I was always in a better mood after seeing Liz. Thank you for that…To everyone who loved her and made her that way.”
Airman First Class Elizabeth Nicole Jacobson was 21. She was awarded the Bronze Star, Purple Heart, the Air Force Achievement Medal, the Air Force Combat Action Medal, the National Defense Service Medal and the Iraq Campaign Medal. She was survived by her parents, her three sisters and brother, her paternal grandfather and maternal grandparents, and her maternal great-grandfather.
Airman First Class Jacobson’s legacy lives on through many memorials, including a plaque bearing her likeness in front of the Air Force Security Police Association’s Security Forces squadron; the Physical Apprehension and Restraint Training facility at Lackland Air Force Base, San Antonio, which is named for her; the Air Force’s Elizabeth N. Jacobson Award for Expeditionary Excellence; and a street on Ali Al Salem Air Base, Kuwait which is named Jacobson Avenue.
Finally, the South Gate at Goodfellow Air Force Base is now named Jacobson Gate and bears a plaque memorializing her sacrifice: a fitting tribute to the Airman whose bright smile once uplifted those who entered the base.
Airman First Class Elizabeth Nicole Jacobson is buried at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Pompano Beach, Florida.
Sources:
https://jewsingreen.org/2008/08/honoring-a1c-elizabeth-n-jacobson/
https://www.fallenheroesproject.org/post/elizabeth-nicole-jacobson
https://www.dvidshub.net/news/printable/555712
https://thefallen.militarytimes.com/air-force-airman-1st-class-elizabeth-n-jacobson/2618900
https://www.jbsa.mil/News/News/Article/463845/319th-trs-remembers-fallen-airman/
https://web.archive.org/web/20170912104822/http://airmanjacobson.com/
https://www.herocards.us/hero296
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