LASTING LEGACY
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BY JON LEWIS
Photos courtesy of Slade Giles
S L A D E G I L E S , L E G ACY P R OJ E C T
SLADE GILES delivers a simple, yet heartfelt message: If you do anything, invest in your community; if you can be anything, be kind. The 43-year-old Palo Cedro resident also happens to live that message. In fact, he credits that guiding belief with keeping him alive. To aid in his battle with cancer, he has set the goal of establishing an orphanage in Tanzania. “It’s given me a whole new spirit with life,” he says. Giles’ penchant for giving back was evident during his undergraduate studies at University of California, Santa Barbara, and later at Touro University California, where he earned a master’s in public health while researching Alzheimer’s disease. Giles says his first dream was to be a doctor: “I always wanted to help people.” That dream expanded in graduate school. Giles was inspired to change healthcare on a national scale and he decided to pursue a master’s in business administration with an emphasis in enterprise information systems. That brings him to 2018, the eventful year that saw him both complete Leadership Redding and be named Firefighter of the Year by the Jones Valley Volunteer Fire
Company. The excitement started in July when Giles, who was vacationing in Thailand, learned the devastating Carr Fire had started. Giles, who was riding an elephant in a jungle when he got the news, spent the next three days in a mad dash back to the states to help his fellow firefighters. “I got in just in time for the ‘fire-nados,’” he says, referring to the cyclones of flames that roared to life when the fire neared the Redding city limits. Giles continued fighting fires until graduate school started at Chico State University. During his first week in the MBA program, he was diagnosed with cancer and underwent emergency surgery at Mercy Medical Center. The diagnosis curtailed another of Giles’ ambitious plans: summiting Mt. Kilimanjaro with his friend Frank Kivuvo. The pair meant to turn the expedition into a fundraiser for children in Tanzania. While Giles began a grueling chemotherapy regimen (seven hours a day, five days a week), Kivuvo and his friends completed the Kilimanjaro climb, using Giles’ cancer battle as inspiration.4 continued on page 50
OCTOBER 2020
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