SENIOR SPOTLIGHT: Dorothy McMillan

Newark resident Dorothy McMillan currently resides at the New Community Extended Care Facility where she previously worked as a nursing assistant.
Newark resident Dorothy McMillan currently resides at the New Community Extended Care Facility where she previously worked as a nursing assistant.

Dorothy McMillan might be the posterchild for New Community.

Originally hailing from Brooklyn, 85-year-old McMillan now resides at the New Community Extended Care Facility, where she used to be an employee. She raised her three sons in the family housing units at New Community years ago.

“I ended up back here. It’s funny how things work out,” she said with a grin.

McMillan said that she relocated to the Brick City due to her now late husband’s job working for the Port of Newark.

“He’s the one who brought me to Newark in the first place,” she said.

The couple had three sons named Sandy, Matthew and Alfred. They all attended Malcolm X Shabazz High in Newark and went on to college, she noted.

McMillan started working at a local department store in Brooklyn at age 14 and later worked at a nursing home. When she came to Extended Care, McMillan said she was a nursing assistant who worked on the third floor, side by side with Veronica Onwunaka, who is now the facility administrator.

“She was one of the workers at the time,” McMillan recalled.

McMillan and her husband met after his sister and her brother were married. Her husband died while working on the job at the port, she said. Her two older sons, Sandy and Matthew, also passed away. Her youngest son, Alfred, lives in Kansas.

For McMillan, living at Extended Care feels familiar and comforting. It’s like being with family, in a way.

“It’s very nice because I know a lot of the workers. It’s like going home,” she said.

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