When Holocaust survivors Herbert Engel and Gary Kirschner — who first met in 1939 when they were Boy Scouts in Shanghai — ran into each other by accident at a recent program in San Francisco, it was quite a scene.
After all, it was the first time they had seen each other in more than 50 years.
Engel, 81, spotted his friend first, noticing a tall man standing nearby. Then the man turned slightly.
“When I looked at his profile, I thought, ‘That’s him.’ I said, ‘Gary?’ ” recalled Engel.
“I hadn’t seen him in ages, but he recognized me,” said Kirschner, 81, smiling broadly.
The chance reunion occurred at an April 7 Holocaust Center event run by S.F.-based Jewish Family and Children’s Services. A week or so later, the two met again to catch up and talk about their lives; they had been completely out of contact since 1960.
Kirschner, who lives in Larkspur, brought a photo of himself at age 16. Engel, a San Francisco resident, brought a photo of himself at 22. He also brought his Israeli passport and a document issued by the Jewish community in Shanghai.
In 1936, Kirschner’s family left Germany for Brazil when he was 7 years old. “We left before the trouble started,” he said.
Well, not exactly, Engel noted, pointing out that the trouble started in 1934.
“Yes,” responded Kirschner, “but nobody believed it. My father, who was a mild-mannered man, said one day that we were leaving. My mother cried and made a fuss. She said nothing would happen to us, that we were Germans. All our relatives thought we were crazy to go, and they stayed behind.”
All those relatives died.
Kirschner’s family lived in Rio de Janeiro until 1939, then moved to Shanghai where some 20,000 Jews, predominantly from Germany and Austria, had fled.
“Shanghai was a haven, one of the few places left for us to go,” Engel said. His family had left Austria in 1939 after his uncle was sent to Dachau, where he committed suicide.
In Shanghai in 1945, Engel and Kirschner met for the first time at a meeting of a British Boy Scout troop.
“It was the thing to do for young boys,” Kirschner said. “We went to camp, we had activities.”
In 1947, Kirschner’s family left Shanghai for Chicago, and two years later, Engel’s family left for Israel. Eventually, both families made it to San Francisco. One night, in 1959, both men attended an international folk dance class at the JCC of San Francisco. That turned out to be reunion No. 1.
“We hung out, we went to parties,” Kirschner said.
After a year or two, however, the two drifted apart because they moved in different circles. And until April, they hadn’t had any contact for more than 50 years.
Kirschner still sees clients, albeit on a flexible schedule, for Oakland Packaging and Supply. He and his wife, Ethel, have two grown daughters and six grandchildren.
A decade ago, Engel retired from Bannerman, a company he built that sold advertising banners. His wife, Kay, has two grown sons from a previous marriage and one granddaughter.
The get-together with the two men and a reporter a few weeks after the Holocaust Center program might seem as if it would be their last meeting — for in July, Engel and his wife are moving to Australia to be closer to his wife’s family.
But both are still very active, both still travel a lot, and both left that meeting convinced they would see each other again.