We will gather at the Memorial Union in the Tripp Commons Room at 3pm on Friday April 27th for a celebration of Joshua Posner’s life. 

There will be another smaller service in New York in June. 

Thank you, Jessica, Matt and Jill 

I’ve been reading the messages left by others over the past few days, and am simultaneously awestruck and unsurprised by all the wonderful stories, memories, accomplishments and moments that you’ve made in your life. You really knew how to get to the bones of an issue, and how to inspire your students to dig and dig to get the answers, write them up perfectly, and defend them against a firing squad. You were a proud husband, father, and grandfather, always full of animated stories about your family’s goings on and good times together in D.C.  I loved swapping stories about Africa, or chuckling at your jokes over a beer at the Terrace.  And while writing my thesis will go down as one of the hardest things I ever had to do, I am still proud, 6 years later, that I did it, and that you pushed me as you did.  I think you’d be proud to see how I’m doing now, and I regret not being able to talk to you one last time, to catch you up on where I landed.  You were larger than life, Josh, and that is how I will remember you, most fondly.  My heart goes out to your family, and I hope that their memories of the good times you all had together are a comfort to them now.

Amy Cook, former graduate student

Farm Manager, Crown Point Ecology Center, Bath, Ohio

I met Josh only a few times within the Andean Paramo Project, of which he was one of the academic advisors… but every single time is so memorable because he was such a kind, thoughtful and funny guy. He always introduced himself as “Josué” to a Spanish-speaking audience, and that is a small but perhaps deep symbol of the kind of person he was and will always be. Chao, Josh. We’ll miss you a lot. 

Josh – In the summer of 1967, you came to St. Louis to camp out at my house, just as Dave Michelmore, Larry Dilg, and I were also using my house as a staging area for our departure to Mississippi.  We were preparing to tutor black kids who were about to integrate white Mississippi schools that fall in the last year of the implementation of Brown v. Board of Education.  I have no memory of exactly what you were doing in St. Louis or where you were headed.

The legend in my family, however, is that after the three of us took off for the long drive to the Deep South, you remained in residence for several days at my house.  Your ebullience and warmth, of course, won over my family.  But my mother and sister never got over your propensity to traipse through the house wearing only a towel, as you strided nobly from the shower in the hall bathroom to the back bedroom which you had staked out. 

At this stage of life, you are entitled to fantasize that they were awestruck at the display of your hyper-masculine varisty crew physique.  However, the punch line of the family legend actually relates more to the display of unparalleled New Rochelle chutzpah.

Either way, your out-sized persona left an indelible mark on my family, just as you have with me – with your endless empathy, your keen intelligence, your lifelong commitment to walk the talk, your unsanctimonious pretension-puncturing humor, and your salt of the earth grin. 

It was wonderful to see you in California for the last big round number birthday, and my thoughts are with you and Jill every day now.

Peace and love,

It will be difficult for us not to think about Josh whenever visiting Madison. We will always feel he will be there and would look for him near to the Union place in the lake waterfront, where he used to seat on Fridays with friends and students. It has been a privilege for me to work with him learning of his scientific talents, technical approaches, sincerity, honesty and commitments to help the poor. He also used to round great discussions with a tremendous sense of humor we will miss: I never came across with a person describing so nicely how difficult is to eat a salteña in Bolivia without ending in a mess, very pictorially. I am sure he will be missed by many of his dear friends and colleagues, disciples and those end-users that benefitted from his approaches and thinking.

Josh came from a family of fighters for the well being of people and we are sure is leaving a nice legacy among you all also with his achievements and commitments in this direction.

I communicated this sad news over the phone to many friends that knew and respected him in here. All requested me to transmit their sincere condolences to all of you: Tito Rodriguez, Edmundo Espinoza, Waldo Telleria, Humberto Alzerreca,  Einstein Tejada and Ricardo Alem, among others.

Our solidarity to all of you in these difficult moments for all of you.

Dear all, and especially to Josh’s family,

Sophie and I feel privileged to have met Josh in one of his many incarnations as scholar and teacher.  When we first arrived at KIZ, it gave me a real boost to hear that Wisconsin was sending its students to Yunnan, and that was down to Josh’s vision and willingness to lead an IGERT project in China.  We have benefited from the many students who have passed through, and even started some collaborations, none of which would have happened without Josh’s leadership.  I also really enjoyed shooting the breeze with Josh when we shared a room during one of his visits up north. 

Last night, Kiersten Warning was telling me how Josh gave her three precious hours last December teaching her how to read an agricultural landscape. 

To read an agricultural landscape.  That’s not just a skill.  It takes a lifetime of hard work, experience, and good taste in problems to make that possible. 

With all our best wishes and good memories of Josh,

Doug and Sophie

I have never been able to shake the odor of the Deke bar from my memory. Despite the many noble thoughts we shared there. Despite the rock and roll music we caned to there (‘wait till the midnight hour’, ‘standing in the shadow of love’, ‘satisfaction’). Despite the sweet memory of all the girls we ogled there. What remains: the smell of stale beer. That just doesn’t seem fair. A youth spent amidst the creepy slim of rotting beer? Wasn’t there mroe going on than that?

What makes that lousy memory something I can endure is that I associate that stale smell with you. Your joy in the bouncing revelry and irresponsible behavior (pretty innocent really) that pervaded the place. You never sat along the wall like the guys with no dates. You never held forth from behind the bar like Steve Soule or Wyatt whatever his name was. You danced and partied. And that memory erases all the old beer smells every time.

Querida familia Posner,

Pude agradecer a Josh la úlitma vez que nos vimos. Hoy agradezco a ustedes por “prestarnos” a Josh y permitir que su energía germinara en Los Andes. Somos muchos los que gozamos de su sabiduría, y quienes podemos demostrar que sus sueños sobre un mundo mejor son posibles. Hace unos años, yo era un joven que no tenía recursos para estudiar, y conocí a Josh, Elías, Rubén y Bernardo, que tenían un proyecto para que jóvenes de Los Andes pudiéramos estudiar para luego trabajar a favor de nuestras comunidades. Hoy soy el Presidente del Consejo Directivo de CONDESAN, y lo que recuerdo todo el tiempo es que Josh decía que si no era el compromiso y la solidaridad, nada podría ayudarnos a resolver nuestros problemas.

Gracias a ustedes por la generosidad de permitirnos conocer a un ser humano maravilloso.