Donald Millar dedicated his life to helping those in need. How he's being remembered

Todd Steele was a young emergency medical technician working in Warren County when he was called one shift to a horrible traffic accident.

The victim in that crash was a high school friend, which added to the tension at the scene, Steele recalled. Things changed when the LifeStar emergency medical helicopter arrived.

"The helicopter landed, Don walked over, and it was just like, calm. You could feel the tension change," Steele said.

Donald Millar, a LifeStar medic, took charge of the scene and began directing people.

"What a difference once he arrived. He just took charge and things calmed down," Steele said.

Millar, who died on Oct. 3 at age 68, spent 39 years calming tense situations while aiding those in need as a member of EmergyCare. He was one of the Erie-based emergency medical agency's first employees when it was founded in 1983, following a stint with the former Erie Ambulance.

Obituary:Donald R. "Don" Millar, 68

A mentor, teacher and friend

Co-workers said Millar could seem gruff, but he was caring and dedicated to his job, and always had time to help out and guide others on the team.

Jim Pyle, who was also an original EmergyCare employee and who was Millar's supervisor for a time, said Millar was a knowledgeable medic who would do anything for anyone.

"He was a great mentor who got along with everybody," Pyle said. "He always took care of his patients very, very well."

Steele, who now serves as director of operations for EmergyCare, said Millar had high standards and expected others to have them.

"Don would hold people to high standards, so certainly a ton of people over the years were taken under his wing and were shown the ropes," he said.

More:Erie woman was mother, nurse, bookstore owner and world traveler

Service to others, including animals

As gruff as Millar could be, he had a heart of gold, Steele said.

"I can't even begin to guess how many of those lives he touched in his career, how many lives he saved," he said.

Millar's service to others sometimes extended beyond helping people.

He helped animals on occasion while on the job, including rescuing a German shepherd and retriever mix from a Harborcreek Township house fire in 1991 and providing oxygen to another dog that was in a burning house in Lawrence Park Township in 2005.

More:Gannon's 'Mr. E' delighted in his students, his collections and his 'Prep Lunch Bunch'

His wife, Corinne, has a photo of Millar walking a horse during one of his EmergyCare shifts. She said Millar was returning from a canceled call one day when he saw the horse walking along Route 430. He stopped his ambulance, got the horse and tied it to a tree in a nearby yard so it wouldn't get hurt or cause an accident, Corinne Millar said.

"He didn't know if the horse belonged to the house, because no one was home, but at least he knew the horse was safe," she said.

More:Fairview coaching great Jack Bestwick dies at 84, remembered by his former players

'EmergyCare is who he was'

Born in Cleveland, Millar moved to the Erie area in 1979, when he started the "Main Stream" program, which assisted students with disabilities, at what was then called Edinboro University of Pennsylvania. Millar was considered the "house mother," as he got the students to and from classes and exposed him to the world "we all take for granted," family members wrote in Millar's obituary.

Millar met his future wife in 1991, when Corinne Millar said she was working at Saint Vincent Hospital as a nurse. She said Millar came into the hospital one day and someone said it was Millar's birthday. She offered to buy Millar a drink at a local tavern, "and he met me and we've been together ever since," she said.

Millar would help raise his wife's two daughters and was an active participant in the lives of their four grandchildren, who called him "Papa do."

"Because when they were young and they would ask for something to be fixed or something, we would say, 'Papa will do it,'" Corinne Millar said.

Millar was a member of the Erie chapter of the Harley Owners Group who also enjoyed camping, boating, fishing and antiquing.

But he especially enjoyed helping others through his work as a paramedic, Corinne Millar said.

"EmergyCare is who he was," she said. "He was a company man all the way. He was a company man out in the field, responding to emergencies to the best of his abilities. He tried to exceed expectations."

Contact Tim Hahn at thahn@timesnews.com. Follow him on Twitter @ETNhahn.

This article originally appeared on Erie Times-News: Donald Millar spent his life aiding others as a paramedic in Erie