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Estranged father's deathbed confession unites 2 families as 1

“It’s unbelievable and incredible that this person, a sister, makes contact with me after 36 years.”

Muskegon native, Jessica Fairbanks received a phone call letting her know that her estranged father, Bryan Brewer Sr., was dying. During her visit, her father revealed that she had a half-brother living somewhere in Germany.

Many people are into the science of genealogy, which is the study of family lineage and history.

There’s an element of thrill to be able to go back and literally connect the dots, locating and communicating with as many family members as you can, with the hope of ultimately tracing the connections all the way back to the origins of your family.

(Mobile/app users: watch the video)

Muskegon native, Jessica Fairbanks received a phone call letting her know that her estranged father, Bryan Brewer Sr., was dying. During her visit, her father revealed that she had a half-brother living somewhere in Germany.

Web communities, like Ancestry.com, have evolved in recent years to help people find lost relatives and build a comprehensive back story of their respective family histories.

A Muskegon woman and her brother recently found out they had relatives overseas, but they didn’t receive the news by way of a website. The method by which the revelation was conveyed to them was just as shocking as the revelation itself.

Jessica Fairbanks says that she and her brother, Bryan, had a turbulent childhood while growing up in Muskegon.

“My dad was very abusive to our family,” Fairbanks said. “He was addicted to drugs, and would often disappear and not come home for extensive periods of time.”

The family would break apart in the mid-1990s.

Seventeen years would pass before either Jessica or Bryan would see their father, Bryan Brewer Sr., again, but their reason for seeing him wasn’t because they wanted to make up for all the lost years.

It was because they found out he was dying.

“In February [2016], we received a phone call that our father was in the hospital,” Fairbanks said. “He has congestive heart failure, and we were told his health was declining.

“My brother and I were asked if we wanted to go visit him one last time.”

Jessica and Bryan drove to Meijer Heart Center in Grand Rapids for their visit. A few days later, Jessica received another call from the hospital, asking if she would come back again to sign some paperwork because she’s co-executor of her father’s affairs.

“I decided to visit him again while I was there the second time, and when I went into his room, he wasn’t in good shape,” Fairbanks said. “I asked him if there was anything he wanted to say to me; anything I should know about.”

The words he began sharing with Jessica were shocking.

“He said, ‘you need to know about your half-brother in Germany.’”

Jessica says she asked her father if he remembered anything about him.

In what felt and seemed like a deathbed confessional, Bryan Brewer began giving Jessica as much information as he could remember about his son.

“He told me his name [Bryan Anthony Steven Bekmann], what he believed was his birthday, his mother’s name, and the part of Germany that they were in,” Fairbanks said. “I pulled an envelope out of my purse, and began scribbling all the information down he was telling me.”

Jessica said she was overwhelmed with all the information her father was revealing to her.

As a child, Jessica remembered learning of her father being in the Army and stationed in Germany.

She says she left her father’s bedside with one mission on her mind.

“I’m going to try and find him,” she said.

Muskegon native, Bryan Brewer Sr. is dying of congestive heart failure, but felt he needed to share a piece of his past with his daughter before his time on Earth came to an end.

Jessica returned to Muskegon and began creating a large poster. On it, she wrote all the information her father was able to tell her about her half-brother.

She even created an email account, though at the time, she wasn’t aware she was spelling her half-brother’s last name wrong: findbryanbeckman@yahoo.com.

“This all happened 36-years-ago, so who knew if [Bryan/Steven] had moved out of Germany, or wanted to know anything about his real father, or even wanted to connect with any of his father’s relations,” Fairbanks added.

Once the poster was finished, she had somebody take a picture of her holding it, then she uploaded that photo to her personal Facebook page, hoping the power of social media could aid in her search.

“I posted the picture on Saturday afternoon [February 20], and honestly, I wasn’t expecting a lot to come of it,” Fairbanks said.

It didn’t take long for her post to catch fire.

“Jessica tagged me in her post, and I watched the ‘shares’ explode,” Bryan Brewer Jr. said, Jessica’s brother, who lives in Holland. “I had to turn my Facebook notifications off because there were so many shares.”

“All of my friends started sharing the picture, and then their friends were sharing it,” Jessica said. “There were even people tagging people who live in Europe and Germany.”

It didn’t take long before Jessica’s original post was shared on Facebook nearly 3,000 times.

Jessica Fairbanks holds sign asking for help finding her half-brother (Feb. 20, 2016).

“My mother came up with a suggestion for me to post the picture of me holding the sign on some public German Facebook pages, so I did that, too,” Fairbanks added.

When she woke up Sunday [February 21] morning, Jessica noticed she’d received a Facebook message from a German newspaper.

“The message said, ‘We saw your post, and we wanted to let you know that we would like to help you find your brother,’” Fairbanks said.

Jessica said the rest of Sunday went by without much else happening, other than her original post being shared several more times.

“Monday [February 22] morning when I woke up, I had another message from the German newspaper saying, ‘Congratulations; you found him; we heard you’ve been in contact; we just spoke with him,’” Fairbanks said. “At first I was thinking this was a joke because I hadn’t talked with him."

Jessica’s original post to her Facebook page on Saturday, February 20th. Two days later, she updated her post, revealing that she had found her long-lost half-brother, Bryan Anthony Steven Bekmann.

“Then it occurred to me to check my email, with the email address I had on the sign.”

Jessica said she started shaking, and signed into that email account as quickly as she could.

“Sure enough, there was an email from Steven Bekmann in that email account,” Fairbanks said. “His initial correspondence with me was asking a few questions.

Jessica says Steven wanted to know what cities her father lived in during his time in Germany, and if the birthday could possibly be July 12 instead of July 19 (which is the birth date her father told her in his confession, and the date she put on the poster).

The German newspaper, who found out Jessica Fairbanks was looking for her half-brother, Bryan Anthomny Steven Bekmann, did a bug report on the two long-lost siblings finding each other.

“I emailed him back immediately, told him what I knew about our father, and the whole story he had told me,” added Fairbanks. “After a few more email exchanges, before long, we knew this was legitimate.”

Once Jessica and Steven confirmed they were half-siblings, a deluge of dialogue between the two began, and also included other unknown family members.

“Through the course of the morning, I was talking to him [Steven] on Facebook messenger, with his 13-year-old son, whose name is also Bryan, and with his mother, Angelika,” Fairbanks said.

During a Skype interview with WZZM 13, Steven Bekmann shared his surprise and reaction to having a long-lost sibling contact him after 36 years.

“It’s incredible,” said Bekmann, from his home in Bad Kreuznach, Germany, which is about 100 miles southwest of Frankfurt. “It’s unbelievable and incredible that this person, a sister, makes contact with me after 36 years.”

Steven details how he first found out that Jessica had launched a search for him.

“I first heard about it that Monday [February 22] morning around 5:30,” Bekmann said. “That’s when a friend called me and said I needed to go check my Facebook right away because there was a post, with somebody claiming to be my sister.

“I logged on and when I first saw the picture of Jessica, I thought it was a fake,” Bekmann added. “I saw the email address on the poster, and decided to message her.”

Bekmann says he never met or had any communication with his biological father [Bryan Brewer Sr.], so Jessica’s email was a monumental moment for him.

“This was the first contact I had to my father in 36 years,” Bekmann said. “Jessica and I talked about our dad, about her mom, my family, her family.

“It’s very emotional for me, and I’m very happy,” Bekmann said

One day, both Jessica and Steven say all their messaging will lead to a meeting.

“My husband and I have already looked up plane ticket prices,” said Jessica, with a big smile on her face. “We won’t be traveling to Germany right away, but I’m hoping someday in the near future we can.”

“Coming to the United States would be difficult for me at this time, but I really hope we can meet,” Bekmann said. “Knowing I have family in America will make me brush up on my English speaking skills, so I can learn to communicate better with Jessica and my new family.”

If their father’s [Bryan Brewer Sr.] dying wish was to somehow get his entire family connected before he passes, his wish was granted.

“Everyone seems pretty excited and happy,” Fairbanks said. “I know I definitely am.”

If you know of a story that you’d like to share in Our Michigan Life, please send an email to Brent Ashcroft:
brentashcroft@wzzm13.com

Our Michigan Life airs weeknights on WZZM 13 News.

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