Past Lake Stevens resident
finishes book and keeps
a promise

BY CHUCK TUCK | JOURNAL REPORTER It’s been over 60 years since the horrific events of the Holocaust, but author Neal McAfee, a former Lake Stevens resident and past member of the Lake Stevens Chamber of Commerce, made a promise to a special woman that he will not let others forget what happened to millions of Jews around the world.

McAfee has written a book entitled “Holocaust Memories of Rosy Mandel.” She was a rose in the garden of death.

McAfee, a Vietnam Veteran, met with Rosy Mandel-Engl, a Holocaust survivor from Belgium, for four months in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., and discussed all that she witnessed during World War II.

While enjoying orange slices, Belgian chocolates and hot tea, Mandel-Engl would share her memories of the horrors of war, the appalling acts of cruelty upon the Jews and many acts of kindness by both friends and enemies.

“Rosy was an inspiration as a survivor and amidst the unspeakable horror and unimaginable atrocities she held God and kindness in her heart trying to help people daily,” McAfee said. “Fifty-eight years after her capture I met her and she held grace, class, and she was a lady I was proud to know. She introduced me to terror greater than I had met in Vietnam.”

After their meetings, Mandel-Engl asked that her memories live on.
“Rosy asked Neal to promise that he would not let the people of the world forget the six million Jews that perished in the Holocaust and also the countless others that lived with constant terror every day,” a written statement said. “Neal made that promise and kept it.”

Mandel-Engl passed away on her 85th birthday in 2005 and after more than seven years after those meetings between she and McAfee, he has finished his book in her memory.

McAfee will be signing books at Lake Stevens Books & Espresso on Friday, August 29 from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m.

McAfee asks that as you read the stories in the book, that you will pass on at least one story to help keep his promise to Rosy.
“We are starting a mentoring program with stickers,” McAfee explains. “Everyone who buys a book will get two ‘Rosy, I will not forget’ stickers, one to keep and one to pass on to someone else and in passing on the sticker to tell of one person in the book who was kind, helpful and shared love, thus moving forward the message.”

Hopefully, the book will allow those not familiar with the horrors faced during this time, an opportunity to see them through the eyes of someone who lived it.

“There are people who honestly don’t believe the Holocaust happened,” McAfee said. “My book is a documented group of true stories, many in Rosy’s own hand, given to me and retold to me so I understood and could share the truth.”

blog comments powered by Disqus