Posted: Thursday, October 27, 2011 8:56 pm
By WALLACE MCKELVEY Staff Writer pressofAtlanticCity.com
John “Jack” Engel doesn’t often visit the stretch of English Creek Avenue where his 1982 Harley Davidson Sportster was sideswiped by a southbound pick-up truck in 1998, and he was left on the side of the road for 10 hours.
He’s never tried to contact the 17-year-old driver, now a woman in her late twenties, who was behind the wheel.
“I don’t want to go there,” said Engel, 52, whose left leg from midcalf down and part of his left elbow were amputated following the accident. “There was a time when I was angry, but that’s a wasted emotion.”
The Egg Harbor Township resident — one of this year’s recipients of the.....Continue Reading
Donald J. Sykes Award — has better things to do. Engel has worked as a full-time maintenance supervisor at the same property-management firm for more than two decades. Every week, he shuttles between condo-association meetings, contractors’ offices, and work sites for the firm’s 60 properties.
In the current economy, he said he has to be creative, shopping around for the best quotes and taking on the smaller jobs himself.
“I don’t believe in putting Band-Aids on things,” he said. “(If) you’re going to fix it, do it right the first time.”
Since he returned to work in March 1999 with a prosthetic leg, Engel said the only thing he doesn’t do is climb ladders.
“I got myself stuck on a roof for 20 minutes one day trying to get down, and it wasn’t worth it,” he said. “Stepping down and you can’t feel where that rung is right away — (I’m) a little leery.”
He spends more than 20 hours each week at Atlantic City Moose Lodge 216, cooking for the lodge’s functions and helping with building repairs.
“I started coming five years ago because friends of mine were here,” he said, sitting in the reception hall Tuesday. “I wound up doing more than actual members, so I figured I might as well join.”
In his spare time, he gathers old newspapers for the mainland animal shelters. Several times a month, he responds to fires, manning the water pump for the West Atlantic City Volunteer Fire Company.
A member since 1993, Engel said his duties haven’t changed much since the accident, although he’s wary of letting his colleagues down.
“If I can avoid going into a fire, I’ll avoid it because I don’t want to let any of the men with me down,” he said. “If I find I can’t do something, that’s not the time to find out — when someone’s life depends on me.”
Engel said he’s not lacking any reminders of that long night in September 1998.
After the accident, he said he ended up about 15 feet off the road in the brush at the edge of the woods. Over the course of 10 hours, he drifted in and out of consciousness, yelling “Help!” every time he was roused by a passing vehicle.
“My helmet got knocked off, so I pulled that over, and I found the boot from my right leg and laid it over the helmet as a pillow,” he said.
“When the sun came up and I looked back over my shoulder, I could see my foot out to the side up in the air with the toes pointing back at me,” he added. “I realized I had a broken leg, but I didn’t realize they were going to cut the leg off.”
But after nine days in the hospital, three months in a rehabilitation center, and several more months at home before returning to work, Engel said he adjusted to his new life.
While the pain from his leg is constant, he said it’s not a problem during the day.
“At night, it’s hell, though,” he said. “Sometimes you’re in that relaxed state and you can feel it throbbing. It just hurts.”
Doris Thompson, co-owner of Thompson Realty, where Engel works, said he rarely takes a sick day. When he does, she said she knows there’s a good reason.
“He has a great wealth of knowledge in his head, and he’s extremely helpful when it comes to the properties,” she said. “He’s been able to do anything we asked him to, short of going up on ladders.”
In his letter recommending him for the Donald J. Sykes Award, Moose Lodge Administrator Frank D’Alonzo said Engel never stopped serving the community.
“It is a privilege to know and work with Jack, who can always be counted on to do whatever is asked of him without hesitation or complaint,” he said.
Kathy Quish, director of the Atlantic County Office of Disability Services, said the award was established in 1989 to honor disabled residents who’ve made significant contributions to the community.
Since that time, she said 93 men and women have received the award.
“It’s really a recognition of their accomplishments,” she said. “Often times, it’s about doing many good works in our community, but also about being a positive role model.”
For Engel, volunteering isn’t about anything that lofty.
“You have to do something with your time,” he said. “Helping others — I don’t have a problem with that.”
Contact Wallace McKelvey:
609-272-7256
WMcKelvey@pressofac.com
