Neil Mulligan DRA ’01, technical director of the Yale Repertory Theatre and a professor at the School of Drama, has been serving the theater community at and outside of Yale for over a decade. He has also been serving his country.

This week, Mulligan began his cross country bicycle journey out of Portland, Oregan in an effort to raise money for fellow veterans. He is asking for donors to pledge a penny or more to one of three highly rated veteran’s organizations — Fisher House Foundation, Intrepid Fallen Heroes Fund or Veteran’s Voices — for every mile he rides. Mulligan will ride back to New Haven, and hopes to reach a total of around 2,500 miles by July 4.

“As a veteran I have been lucky twice…I want to do something to help those who were not as lucky,” Mulligan writes on the project’s web page.

Mulligan served as an infantryman in the Gulf War and, most recently, as a medic at a military hospital in Afghanistan, where he treated both wounded soldiers and civilians.

Correction: June 3

A previous version of this article incorrectly stated the number of miles Mulligan plans to bike.