The daughter of political trailblazer Robert Millender carries a family legacy of service into her art, teaching, and community while shaping what aging looks like in Detroit showing what it means to keep living fully — and to bring others along.
The music starts and Patricia Millender is already in motion. Inside a bright room at Detroit’s Hannan Center, she joins other elders stepping through the hustle, a dance she only recently added to her schedule. At first, she could hardly make it halfway through without catching her breath, but now her feet move confidently, her laughter cutting through the rhythm as she keeps pace with the beat. “At first, I was out of breath halfway through the class,” she said. “But I’m not anymore.” For Patricia, 77 years old and still curious about everything, staying in motion is not optional. It is often said that if you don’t use it, you lose it, and she knows that truth from the inside out. Aging brings with it the temptation to sit still, to let life slowly pass by. But she has chosen something else entirely—to keep showing up, to keep creating, and to keep giving back. “My mission is to live life to the fullest, to enjoy it, and to bring some people along with me,” she said.
Her life’s arc bends all the way back to her parents, who first set down roots in Detroit. “I was born here in Detroit at Henry Ford Hospital and so were all my siblings,” she recalled. “My mother was born in Georgia and my father in Mississippi, but they moved here as young children. And they met at the Greystone Ballroom, which I think a lot of people know about the history of that. At that time, Blacks could only go to the Greystone on certain days of the week.” Their marriage began with joy but quickly intersected with history’s harsh turns. Six days after their wedding, Pearl Harbor was bombed, and her father enlisted. He served in Italy, where he and other Black soldiers discovered a freedom they did not know at home. “They could walk around Italy, go into restaurants. They weren’t facing any racism. And when they got home, they were going to make sure they worked towards changing America so that soldiers who fought for America could certainly be able to go into any restaurant or club or hotel that they wanted to.”
That experience fueled her father’s determination. When he returned, he worked at the post office, then considered a prized position for Black men, studied at night, and eventually earned a law degree. His circle included veterans like Coleman Young, who would become Detroit’s first Black mayor. Robert Millender himself became a prominent political figure in Detroit, and his name lives on in the Millender Center, a downtown landmark. “That kind of just shapes a little bit of who I’ve come to be, specifically here in the city of Detroit,” Patricia said, reflecting on how his drive for justice and education defined their family. Her sister Beatrice, affectionately called Penni, followed the same path of service, beginning in social work before becoming a judge at Detroit’s 36th District Court. The Millender household was one where ambition was never separated from responsibility.
Patricia’s own path unfolded in layers. She began as a teacher for profoundly deaf preschoolers, then became an audiologist for Detroit Public Schools, testing hearing loss across the district. Her husband’s job with General Motors took the family first to Mexico and then to Texas, and Patricia carried her talents with her. It was there that she decided to lean fully into her love of art.
“I decided I didn’t want to teach anymore because I was always interested in the arts,” she said. Architecture seemed like a dream until she realized it required another four years of college. “They told me there was a design school about a mile away, and maybe I might be interested in that. So, I went over there, interviewed, and decided I would study interior design instead. It was only a two-year program. I graduated number one in my class.”
That decision carried her to the Tandy Corporation, parent company of Radio Shack, where she joined the design team.
“I was on their design team when they started changing their colors from orange to red, black, and gray,” she said, recalling her contribution to a new corporate image. Returning to Detroit, she brought with her an impressive portfolio, so strong that Wayne State University invited her to be a graduate teaching assistant. The offer came with a stipend and free tuition, and she accepted. But when her oldest daughter prepared to leave for college, the reality of tuition bills pushed her back into teaching. “I needed some real money,” she said with a smile. So, she returned to Detroit Public Schools, where she remained until retirement.
Art, however, never left her side. A ceramics class she took during design school introduced her to Pewabic Pottery, where she studied for 25 years, creating pieces that became extensions of her curiosity. Quilting came next, sparked by a sorority sister’s invitation to a show.
“I went to a quilt show and joined the quilt group the next month,” she said. “And I’ve been a member ever since.” She is still active in that circle, and this very month she and her peers are installing 140 quilts for exhibition.
Patricia’s devotion to community has been steady. She has been an active member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc. for 57 years, a Girl Scout leader for her daughters and later her granddaughters, and for three decades she sang in her church choir. She believes in surrounding herself with youth as a way of keeping her own spirit alive.
“When you’re around young people, you don’t get old,” she said. Her grandchildren are the center of that energy. She takes them to the Detroit Institute of Arts, to the Charles H. Wright Museum, and to the Science Center. She even loaded them onto a train for a trip to Chicago, where they spent an entire day at the aquarium. “We just all fell in love with the aquatic animals,” she said, her voice soft with memory.
That impulse to keep giving and to keep moving forward is what brought her to the Hannan Center 15 years ago. Founded in 1925, Hannan is one of the city’s oldest nonprofits dedicated to serving older adults, designed to combat the isolation that can come with aging. Its programs offer art classes, fitness opportunities, history workshops, and other community-based learning meant to remind elders that their lives remain rich with possibility. Patricia has become one of its most dedicated members.
“Everything that they have, I take classes,” she said. “Yoga, different dance classes, fragrance classes, history classes about Black history, painting classes, drawing classes. I’m just that curious. And I’ve always been that busy a person.” Her art has been shown in exhibits hosted by the center, and she has forged friendships that make the place feel like a second home. “The people there are just marvelous. Everybody needs to belong to some place that’s wonderful and giving and loving. And that’s Hannan Center.”
“At Hannan we see every day how our programs spark growth and connection,” said Hannan Center CEO Vincent Tilford. “Participants like Patricia Millender show what’s possible joining art workshops, lively discussions and creative projects that invite older adults to learn and connect and create alongside like-minded lifelong learners. Their enthusiasm reminds me that Hannan is more than a place, it’s a community where curiosity and creativity never have to retire.”
For Patricia, the Hannan Center has allowed her to expand her world even further, connecting her to institutions like the DIA and Charles H. Wright Museum in new ways and creating space for her to share those experiences with her grandchildren. She sees her life not as winding down but as expanding.
“If you give back, there’s no way your life can’t be better,” she said. “Because then you don’t worry so much about, oh, my back hurts today or my hip hurts, because that’s certainly a part of aging. Don’t get me wrong. My back is hurting right this minute. But I go to the doctor, take care of it, and keep on pushing.”
Even as she fills her days with dance, pottery, and quilting, Patricia carries the weight of history’s warning. She is deeply concerned about America’s political direction.
“My major concern is what’s going to happen to America. Is fascism going to take over?” she asked. She remembers meeting Holocaust survivors, seeing the tattoos on their arms, and listening to their stories. “This scares me. My parents fought too long, and my dad spent too much of his money for us to have to start all over again. So, I’ll keep doing my part. I’ll be marching when they ask us to march. I’m kind of old to be marching, but if I can hustle for an hour, I can march.”
Her grandchildren, all advanced placement students in high school, remain her deepest hope. She wants them to inherit not money but richness of spirit and opportunity.
“I want them to live a life as rich as my life has been. And I don’t mean with money.” That richness, for her, is measured in education, art, and community, the very things that carried her from Henry Ford Hospital in 1948 to the dance floor of the Hannan Center in 2025.
Patricia Millender lives with conviction that one life, lived in full color, is enough. From the Greystone Ballroom where her parents first met, to the pottery wheels of Pewabic, to the quilt shows she still helps hang, to the hustle lessons that keep her moving, she embodies a truth that resonates across generations: life will keep giving as long as you keep using it. And so, she does, every single day.
