Two residents celebrate their 100th birthdays

Mary McNulty, left photo, celebrates her 100th birthday at Weinberg Campus last week with family members Roberta Reddin, niece, and Reddin's granddaughter Eva. Emelia Scurci, right photo, celebrated her 100th birthday with a party at Marianacio's with her family including grandchildren, from left, Mary Ann Butler, Lisa Scurci, Gail Nelson, standing, Michael Butler, Dan Symoniak and David Butler. Photo by John Rusac Purchase color photos at www.BeeNews.com

Celebrations of a century of life were held in two Amherst assisted living facilities last week.

Emilia Scurci, born Aug. 8, 1907 in Italy, was thrown a birthday party last week at Basset Park Manor where she has been a resident since October 2006.

She came to the United States at the age of 8 with her mother and 18-month-old brother Anthony. After arriving at Ellis Island, knowing only Italian, Scurci lived around the country including Pennsylvania, Florida, Lackawanna and Buffalo.

She learned to speak English on her own and attended school. Her first job was at a candy factory in Buffalo, then worked as a seamstress and sold men's suits at M. Wile where she met her husband Roger.

They were married July 27, 1923 and had three children - Vera, Danny and Joan. She has eight grandchildren and 16 great-grandchildren.

Across town, Mary McNulty was also celebrating her 100th birthday. She was born Aug. 11, 2007, and was one of 12 children.

Joined by family, staff and residents, a party was held in her honor at Dosberg Adult Home and Assisted Living Program, part of Weinberg Campus.

She enjoys visiting with family and the therapy dogs and participating in Intergenerational "Kid Visit" activities. For years she had enjoyed completing puzzles, such as word search.

McNulty has been an Amherst resident for only a short time, moving to Western New York after her older sister, with whom she lived with, passed away. She moved to live with a nephew then moved into Weinberg.

She was born in Brooklyn and worked as a clerk at the Austin Nichols Bottling Company for 47 years.