While speaking at an event hosted by the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Boca Raton, Florida, Sam Ron, 97, got the surprise of a lifetime.
A man who he worked alongside at a labor camp during World War II was also in attendance, though he didn’t initially know it.
“He jumped out from his seat and came running over to me,” Ron told The Washington Post. “He started hugging me and said, ‘You are my brother!’”
As Ron shared his story to an audience of roughly 400 people, one of those in attendance perked up when he heard Ron share his given name: Shmuel Rakowski.
Once Ron finished his presentation, Jack Waksal, 97, approached Ron and he immediately recognized him. It took a little for the memories to come back to Ron, but when they did he described it as a “very emotional moment.”
‘It was unbelievable.’
The two men, who were teenagers at the time, worked alongside each other at Pionki, a labor camp in Poland. In total Ron survived five different camps.
“Hard work, bad conditions, cold, hunger,” Ron told CBS Miami. “Hundreds of people died. It wasn’t uncommon to wake up in the morning and find the person next to you cold.”
But somehow they survived the atrocities of war, together.
Both men described working for 24 hours in a row or risk being shot, eating bark off a tree because there had been no food for two weeks, and fearing the random selection of those who would be sent to Auschwitz.
The camp was dismantled in 1944, and while Ron went to a concentration camp in Germany, Waksal managed to escape and hide in the forest for months before the end of the war.
He hid with 15 Jews. Only six survived. His brother, who was with him in the forest was shot by Nazis one month before liberation. His parents and two sisters were killed in Auschwitz.
“I was lucky I was not killed,” he said.
After the war, Ron was able to reunite with his parents in Poland. He eventually moved to what was Palestine in 1946 before moving to Ohio in 1956.
Waksal returned to his hometown in Poland where he was able to reunite with his wife. They moved to Germany and lived in a displaced persons camp for five years before also moving to Ohio.
As their families grew and they became older, both men, who spent their lives dedicated to educating others about the Holocaust, moved to Florida.
Despite living approximately an hour away from each other and regularly educating the public, they never crossed paths, until March 20 when they both attended the annual gala.
“Oh, I was all excited,” Ron said. “This was unusual. It’s 79 years now. We’re 97 years old!”
“You think it’s never going to happen,” Waksal said. “But it did happen.”
Since their reunion they have spoken again and plan to keep in touch.
I’m so happy Sam and Jack got to reunite. I can’t imagine the emotions both of them experienced upon seeing the other alive.
Please share this heartwarming story.
