It’s coming up on two years since Joshua Brumm died. He was 24 when he died of injuries suffered in a skiing accident.
Joshua was a graduate of Seward High who loved working with special needs students, his mom Lynn Brumm said. He had attended Concordia University for three years, working on his Director of Christian Education certification.
He worked at Camp Omega in Minnesota, Camp Perkins in Idaho and Camp Southern Ground in Georgia. He was a Summer Horizons leader at St. John Lutheran Church in Seward and a paraeducator at Centennial Public School in Utica.
“At Centennial he worked with an autistic kid, and that started his love for special needs kids,” Lynn said.
Joshua took a job at Beaver Creek in Colorado where he could teach kids to ski, and he fell in love with the sport, Lynn said.
Camp Southern Ground was founded by Zach Brown for special needs children and military families. Joshua worked there in 2019, and that’s when he met Tessa Baker. She was another counselor, and they hit it off. She recalled meeting him while practicing improv.
“He came on very subtle, a little quiet but not shy, but soon became the easiest person to talk to,” Tessa said. “The most outrageously funny characters I have ever met. Someone who is unapologetically themself. An empath.
“He was my best friend that summer.”
Tessa also met Stan Tucker that summer. He founded Leap for Literacy, a program whose mission is “to promote literacy, kindness and a love of reading and writing in children to encourage their success in life,” according to its website.
Lynn said Tucker’s goal was to equip the campers to write their stories and then provide them with a way to have the stories published.
In 2021, the summer after Joshua died, Tucker offered the Share Your Story program to the camp staff.
“The general idea of what I wanted to write about came very naturally,” Tessa said. “I just returned to Camp Southern Ground, feeling very hesitant about my next summer. One of the reasons this place was so special to me was because of Joshua, and he wasn’t there.”
When Tucker told the staff about Share Your Story, Tessa knew what she would write.
“Being at the place where we met, being offered the opportunity to write about anything I wanted, Joshua was the first person to cross my mind,” she said.
The result was “Joshua’s Tree,” a story about a tree at camp and the young man who made it feel loved.
The tree is a real tree at Camp Southern Ground, Tessa said. It’s located in a grassy field outside the counselors’ living area. Lots of counselors use the space, but not as often as Joshua and Tessa, she said.
“I chose the tree because of multiple reasons, but I guess the biggest one was that’s where we spent a lot of time together,” Tessa said.
The other was a Joshua Tree shirt Joshua wore often.
“It was always ironic and funny,” she said.
The hardest thing about writing the story was her desire that it be great.
“Wanting it to portray Joshua in a way that allowed his family and friends to connect with the book,” she said. “As difficult as a topic as it was, writing about Joshua actually made me happy. It made me happy that I get to share this story, and people can continue to enjoy Joshua.”
The book is illustrated by Diana Resendiz. While Tessa wasn’t able to meet Resendiz, she sent some photos of Joshua and of the camp and sketched page ideas.
“With no communication with her at all, she did beyond any of my expectations,” Tessa said. “She captured all of the moments perfectly.”
Lynn said she didn’t hear from Tessa after Joshua died. One day, her daughter Morgan got a message from Tessa, telling her about “Joshua’s Tree.” Morgan was home the day the book came in the mail, Lynn said.
“It’s a special, sweet story about how Joshua loved camp,” Lynn said.
She received two copies and immediately ordered more. She found the book on Amazon.com, and Carla Ketner at Chapters Books and Gifts in Seward said she would sell the book and donate the proceeds to either Camp Southern Ground or Leap for Literacy.
People Lynn has never met have contacted her to share their stories about Joshua.
“People are saying ‘he was such a good listener, he was a constant encouragement to me and brought me out of a dark place,’” she said.
She told Tessa she’d given Lynn an incredible gift.
“As a parent who lost a child, I want to share Joshua with the world,” Lynn said. “Tessa equipped me to do that.”
