At the invitation of the town, Joel Eppstein and his wife Chanah visited Hechingen in 1986 with other former Jewish citizens, including his childhood friend Manfred Bernheim (Manef Biran). For Joel, his old hometown was a place he was eager to show his children and grandchildren. However, before this could happen, Joel Eppstein died on March 18, 1996 in Kibbutz Hama'apil.

A year later, his daughter Shlomit Zemach, together with her husband and children, traveled to Hechingen to get to know the town where her father and grandfather were born and had grown up.