MINN. MAN LEAVES N.Y.C. NEARLY 1M
BY SCOTT SHIFREL / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
MONDAY, NOVEMBER 12, 2001, 12:00 AM
Joe Tomeczko was a little old man who often carried around a paper bag, took buses everywhere and tried to earn a few bucks by doing odd jobs for neighbors and friends. But another side of the 86-year-old Polish immigrant was discovered after he died in Minneapolis on Oct. 14 and left nearly $1 million to the City of New York. “He wanted to somehow honor the victims of the World Trade Center disaster,” said his attorney, William Wangensteen, who helped Tomeczko change his will after Sept. 11. “He felt a real kinship for the whole city and was very saddened by what happened,”
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I Love You, Joe Temeczko
I am sorry you died with your heart broken,
but you were on the way to mending it in your
usual fashion, doggedly, with persistence,
never giving up, no matter how hard and dry
the bones they gave you to gnaw on,
your only nourishment. I love you for that,
and for your dapper air, your ascots,
the beautiful women in your embrace,
before you lost it all, and came to America.
The war drove you from your Polish home,
to this shore, under the gaze of that beautiful,
but blank-eyed lady, the statue in the poster
next to your bed, where you slept with dreams,
and nightmares, even children can comprehend.
You felt this country’s warm embrace, you said,
and so made yourself at home here, a peddler
at heart, selling, selling useful things to everyone
you met. A chandelier to your lawyer, soap to your
grocer, tools and services to neighbors. But your greatest
service you gave away for free. “I learned a lot about
persistence from him,” says the man next door, the one
you trusted to handle what was done with your small,
strong body and your possessions after you died. Joe,
my friend, my teacher, generous and demanding, no one
you touched or didn’t touch is unmoved by your spirit.
You expected the best from people, and in the end
that’s exactly what you received. Yes, once again
you’ve beat me up the stairs, but I am following
close behind. My dear, dead darling,
accept this small kiss from these unworthy lips of mine,
gently, and wherever you are, or aren’t, know
how much I love you, and always will.
Kimberly Townsend Palmer 