Margaret Mary Henighan died on December 9 at Garnet Health Center in Middletown, N.Y. She was 86. She had been a resident at the Montgomery Nursing Home for seven years and had just been transferred to Middletown Park Rehabilitation Center in November of this year.
She was born in New Rochelle, N.Y. and is survived by three sisters, Helen, Mary Jo and Patricia, and a brother, Thomas. Her nephews include Stephen, Michael, Kevin, Brian and Richie, a pre-deceased nephew, John and nieces Phoebe, Kathleen, Annmarie, Donna, Kim, Laura and Bernadette.
Margaret received her R.N. diploma at Mt. Vernon Hospital in 1961 and later studied in Vermont to become a Nurse Practitioner. She traveled with her youngest sister and her mother to visit relatives in Scotland and then to other parts of Great Britain. She also took her mother around Ontario and into the wilds of Quebec, Canada to visit her brother and his family. In the ‘70’s, she moved to Colorado to work as a nurse practitioner at a rural health clinic. Next, her wanderlust brought her to San Francisco, California to join her youngest sister, Patricia where she became a loving aunt to Patricia’s daughter, Bernadette. She also became “Ak-Tu” as Aunt Margaret was hard to say. This nick-name stuck with Bernadette’s children, Skyla and Nicholas DeMaro as well.
In the ‘90’s, she returned to New York and the Hudson Valley. After retirement, she started writing poetry and participated in a production, “To Whom I May Concern” in NYC about the onset of early Alzheimer’s which she was beginning to experience. Her sisters were able to spend time with her as her disease progressed. She will be remembered at the Montgomery Nursing Home as “The Walker” since she was always on the move. Her ashes will be interred at Gate of Heaven Cemetery in Hawthorne, N.Y.
In lieu of flowers, dedicate your gift to honor Margaret Henighan to the Alzheimer's Association of Orange and Sullivan Counties.