Eleven decades on, Valley Stream's Henrietta Dobin, 110, still going strong

Henrietta Dobin was born nine months before the sinking of the Titanic, when William Howard Taft occupied the White House, and three years before the start of World War I.

All of which is to say Dobin, a resident of the The Bristal Assisted Living at North Woodmere in Valley Stream, has lived through some monumental changes, from the Great Depression to women's suffrage.

The supercentenarian celebrated her 110th birthday on Thursday surrounded by her two children, four grandchildren, five great-grandchildren and her 107-year-old friend Belle Littenberg.

She is believed to be Long Island's oldest resident, possibly the sixth oldest person in the state and among roughly 80 living U.S. residents to make it to 110.

But Dobin, who still plays bridge three times a week, takes in a daily bingo game, accessorizes her own outfits, and doesn't even use reading glasses, said Thursday there's no secret to her long and healthy life.

"Live your life the way you want to live it," Dobin said at a party at The Bristal. "Be good to yourself. Be good to others."

After living in East Rockaway for 35 years, she moved to The Bristal in 2016. Over her more than 11 decades, Dobin has marked numerous accomplishments.

She traveled to nearly every continent with her husband, Solomon, who died in 1990; hitchhiked from New York to Texas during the Depression; was an accomplished artist, an avid golfer, raised two children and worked at the Brooklyn Standard Union newspaper, and later, the Nassau County Museum of Art until the age of 108 — stopping only because of COVID-19 concerns.

"She has a quality that lifts others up to look at themselves in a better light," said grandson Richard Markowitz, who is also Dobin's doctor. "She can do this because she doesn't define herself by her age."

Gloria Dickenson, 68, has been traveling from Canarsie, Brooklyn every weekend to take care of Dobin.

"She's a beautiful person who thinks of others before herself," Dickenson said.

After a life well lived, filled with travel, friends, family and 60 years of marriage, there's not much Dobin would change.

"I am satisfied," she said. "I have really no regrets."

By Robert Brodsky

robert.brodsky@newsday.com@BrodskyRobert

Robert Brodsky is a breaking news reporter who has worked at Newsday since 2011. He is a Queens College and American University alum.