A Kagawa Street Story

By IZZY KOCHER | Junior Reporter | 14 years old

We all have that one neighbor, the one that has been there all of your life, but you know very little about. For me, that neighbor was an elderly man who lived in the little house across the street. We saw him walking most days down to the bluffs to read his newspaper.

This is the story of Franz George Szymanski, a 100-year-old man who loves clam chowder. We learn about his long life in the Palisades told from my interview with him over a FaceTime call during COVID and some details provided by Laura, his granddaughter, who came to stay and take care of him as the pandemic began last spring.

On September 16, 1925, the SS Bremen docked in New York carrying 5-year-old Franz, along with his mother and sister. They had fled the poverty and hardship of Landsberg, Germany, to meet their Dad and Auntie who were already in the U.S.

They immediately moved to St. Louis, Missouri, where Franz grew up. He attended Washington University before going to the University of Illinois. During his time at the University of Illinois, Franz joined the military and was deployed overseas during WWII as a Master Sergeant. He prepared detailed drawings for bridges, hospitals, warehousing projects and pipelines.

Franz served with the 5210 Engineer Service Group headquarters in Australia for about 29 months. When his time at the war was over, Franz went back to the University of Illinois where he received his degree in architectural engineering in October of 1947.

After finishing college Franz worked for a while as a structural engineer in Beverly Hills. The bulk of Franz’s career was spent at Kurily, Szymanski, Tchirkow, Inc. in Santa Monica, designing buildings across Los Angeles. I asked him if he had a favorite building he had worked on, but he said no, that “he loved them all and couldn’t choose just one.”

I asked Franz what brought him to the Pacific Palisades. He told me that a work buddy who lived on Greentree told him that the Palisades was a “nice place to live.” He arrived in 1954 from Detroit and originally rented a house on Galloway Street. He bought his current house on Kagawa in 1955 and has lived in it since it was built, got married and raised a family here in the Palisades. Even today at over 100, he can still point to all the houses on our street and tell you who lived there, when they moved and who rebuilt the next house, etc.

It’s hard to imagine what the Palisades looked like back then, nearly 70 years ago. Franz remembers all the eucalyptus trees that we still have today, but they were obviously much smaller back then. When asked what he would say to convince someone to move to the Palisades today, Franz replied that there is a “beautiful school system,” and being part of the Pacific Palisades school system my entire life, I certainly agree.

Franz celebrated his 100th birthday with a mask, socially distanced on our street, with lots of neighbors, Laura and his family who came into town. He told stories and jokes and had cupcakes to celebrate.

His journey continues, but he has finally moved on from Kagawa Street and the Palisades to an assisted living facility in Santa Monica. But his house remains and so does his story.

As a final question when I talked with Franz, I asked him what advice with all his 100 years he would have for me and the younger generation. He took his time before saying with a bit of a chuckle: “follow the yellow brick road!”

So, the next time you spot that one neighbor that you always see walking on your street or an elderly person who you don’t know much about, reach out to them, say hello and you may uncover an inspiring story on your street, just like I did.