(UPI) A pair of brothers reunited in New York state 60 years after they were put up for adoption and separated.

Don Crawford, 67, said he and his older brother, Bruce DeLude, 69, were kept together in foster care for years, but they were put up for adoption separately when Don was only 7 years old and Bruce was 9.

"I don't think we even knew that they were going to really separate us until they put me in one car, and him in another car, and that was the last I saw of him," Crawford told WGRZ-TV.

The brothers said they spent decades trying to track each other down, but had no luck until DeLude's daughter, Heather, took charge of the search and obtained a phone number she believed to belong to her long-lost uncle.

"I left three messages for Donald, and the third one he called me, and we made it happen," Heather DeLude said.

The brothers finally met face to face in an emotional reunion surrounded by friends and family.

"I didn't think it was real for a second," DeLude said of finding out his brother was found. I was in total shock.

Crawford said the family is now planning to celebrate the anniversary of their reunion as "Christmas in September."

A pair of Nebraska sisters who hadn't seen each other in more than 50 years recently shared details of their similar reunion -- which came about thanks to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Bev Boro, 53, a medication aide at Dunklau Gardens in Fremont, said she knew the name of her long-lost sister, Doris Crippen, 73, but had been unable to locate her despite decades of searching.

The sisters, who have different fathers and were raised in separate homes, were finally reunited when Crippen, who was recovering from COVID-19, ended up as one of Boro's patients when she was transferred from Nebraska Medicine.

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