A love story: Couple’s commitment to Camp Rancho Framasa is a family affair
Nearly 20 years ago, Kevin Sullivan took his best shot on the basketball court at Camp Rancho Framasa, giving his wife, Angi, an engagement ring. The couple has also stayed committed to the camp.
By John Shaughnessy
BROWN COUNTY—The temptation is to start with the first story that Kevin Sullivan shares—the story of the pony, the cabin filled with female counselors and the practical joke that nearly cost Sullivan his job in his first week of work at Camp Rancho Framasa near Nashville.
That anecdote will come later, but there’s a more fitting story to begin a look at Sullivan’s 25 years of dedication to the Catholic Youth Organization camp that has been a temporary summer home to an estimated 500,000 children in its 61-year history.
The better beginning is a love story that unfolded between two young camp employees at Camp Rancho Framasa 20 years ago this August.
For three years back then, Kevin Sullivan and Angi Pozek had been best friends while working summers at the camp, best friends who always seemed to be dating someone else until he finally asked her for a date at the end of the third summer.
After getting a “yes” to that question, Kevin took just a month to pop the ultimate question in a relationship. That fall, he carried an engagement ring with him as they returned to the camp so he could finish cleaning the house he shared with other male counselors that summer.
“The camp was pretty dead,” Kevin recalls. “We were getting ready to leave and I said, ‘What’s that on the basketball courts? Let’s check it out.’ I got out of the car and went over there. It was dark and the headlights were on. I got down on one knee and asked her to come over there. She came over and I pulled out the ring. I wanted to give it to her there because it was where we kissed for the first time.”
“I’m a little timid with surprises, but that was a good one,” Angi says. “That was a very important time for us.”
They made a commitment to each other that night. Ever since, they have also continued a commitment to the children who come to Camp Rancho Framasa.
While this is Kevin’s 25th year with the camp—and his 22nd year as its director—Angi is an assistant camp director who has been working with her husband most of those years. The couple, who have been married nearly 19 years, and their five children even make their home on the grounds of the now-year-round camp.
“This is home. This is our community,” Angi says. “The counselors and the staff are family. It can never be a job. Kevin and I say it’s our ministry. To be able to touch lives and be touched by others, it’s so meaningful.”
Like most love stories, there’s also a lot of hard work and sacrifice behind the scenes.
“Back in the late ‘70s, early ‘80s, a high percentage of camps closed across the nation, especially religiously affiliated camps,” says Edward J. Tinder, the CYO’s executive director. “They couldn’t afford it. We decided we weren’t going to let our camp close. We decided there was a great power in camps for children. We decided to take it to the next level. To do that, we needed a leader to drive it, and Kevin Sullivan is the guy who made it happen. When I say Kevin, I have to include his wife, Angi, and their family.”
Through the Sullivans’ leadership, Rancho Framasa has been transformed from a “sleepy summer camp” to a year-round facility that is “the outdoor classroom for the archdiocese,” according to Tinder.
The camp now has an amphitheater, winterized cabins and a winterized dining hall. Beyond the summer camp, the facility offers retreat programs, outdoor education for schools, and leadership programs for junior high and high school students.
Before their change to full-time, year-round responsibility began to take shape in the early 1990s, the Sullivans pieced together part-time jobs throughout the year so they could continue the work they loved at the summer camp.
“The atmosphere we’ve always tried to create is to be amongst the children,” Kevin says. “Survey after survey, year after year, shows that the number one reason that kids come to our camp is because of the relationship with the staff and the counselors. They want to share goofy jokes with you, talk about their dog, talk about your dog, and they want you to listen to them.”
Counselors are encouraged to use a philosophy that’s simply called “TMM.”
“That means, ‘Tell Me More,’ ” Kevin says. “When you’re stuck in a conversation with a camper say, ‘Tell me more.’ We want an emotional and physical environment that’s safe for them, and we want adults who want to share with them and listen to them.”
Ask Kevin about the improvement he’s most proud of in his years of directing the camp and he doesn’t mention a physical improvement. Instead, he mentions the caliber of the staff today.
“It’s a staff that doesn’t look to do practical jokes. They look to be a role model to the kids,” Kevin says. “I’d feel safe to have them baby-sit any of our kids. I’m not sure I’d be able to say that 25 years ago.”
That leads to his infamous story of the pony, the cabin filled with female counselors and the practical joke that nearly cost him his job during his first week of training at the camp.
“I liked practical jokes. I thought they were part of camp,” he recalls. “Me and three other guys took a pony and put it in the middle of the room in the female staff cabin. The horse wasn’t excited about that. He made some screaming pony sounds in the dark and the women didn’t know what was going on. I almost got fired. I learned a valuable lesson about practical jokes. They’re not part of our culture anymore.”
He also learned another important lesson when some of his five children—ranging in age from 15 to 3—started attending the camp as campers.
“I became a much better camp director when my kids went to camp,” he says. “What I recaptured as a parent was the value of free play. Camp is supposed to be a lot of fun. I also understood more that this is a long day. We need to get these kids in bed to make sure they get enough sleep.”
He measures part of the camp’s success by how many former campers send their children there—a group that includes Bob Heidenreich, a former camper and counselor.
“If it wasn’t for Kevin and Angi, I don’t think this camp would have gone the way it has,” says Heidenreich, who was a camper when Kevin was a counselor. “They’ve made it their life mission. They’ve done some extraordinary things down there. My son will be going for his first full week there this summer.”
Heidenreich is an example of the strong bond of “family” the Sullivans have helped to create at Camp Rancho Framasa.
As a member of the 1413th Engineer Detachment Unit of the Indiana National Guard, Heidenreich recommended the unit’s community service project that helped build the camp’s amphitheater.
While the camp has expanded the Sullivans’ scope of family, it has also deepened their faith.
“It’s definitely given me an appreciation that God’s presence can be anywhere,” Kevin says. “You look at the trees, you feel the breeze, you see the fox and the birds, and you definitely know you’re in God’s creation. You definitely see the hand of God at camp.”
That feeling seeps through all the memories, all the life experiences that Angi and Kevin have shared on these grounds.
“It’s been truly such a gift to grow up here from 10 to now,” says Angi, who attended the camp as a child. “To take the gifts I’ve received and be able to give them back, I’m just very passionate about this experience. It fits very well for us. Neither one of us wanted to be that couple where you just see each other in the evening and your work is separate. We knew we wanted to be involved in each other’s lives.”
Kevin felt all those emotions recently as he stood near the place where he first kissed Angi and later gave her a ring.
“The other night I was out near the basketball court,” he says. “There’s a fog that comes in there at night between Rattlesnake Ridge and Deer Ridge. I remembered it as a kid—the fog, the smell. I try to remember and appreciate the tradition of all this. I think there could be another kid out there doing the same thing. Maybe he’ll meet his wife out here some day. Maybe he’ll become the director of this camp.”
It could be the start of another love story. †
