Kevin, Edward, Rita and Adrian Gillis during Christmas dinner on Dec 25, 2012, a few months before Rita died. She passed on March 15, 2013. The brothers are donating $250,000 to the Cape Breton Regional Library over 10 years in her honour.Kevin Gillis/Kevin Gillis
The organizers: Kevin, Adrian and Edward Gillis
The pitch: Donating $250,000
The cause: James McConnell Memorial Library in Sydney, N.S.
Edward Gillis was visiting New York last year when he received the results of medical tests from his doctors back home in Ottawa.
The results confirmed what Mr. Gillis feared; he had stage four non-Hodgkin lymphoma, a type of cancer that develops in the lymphatic system. “It kind of turned things upside down,” Mr. Gillis, 65, recalled. “All that change in your life makes you start thinking about your own mortality.”
He also began thinking about legacy and “what I would leave behind, if anything.”
Rita Gillis taught for 40 years.Kevin Gillis/Kevin Gillis
During the New York trip, Mr. Gillis toured the city’s public library and he was struck by the number of reading rooms dedicated to donors. He thought about his mother, Rita Gillis, a long-time teacher in Sydney, N.S. and everything she had done for so many children. “And frankly, for us personally as her sons.”
Ms. Gillis, who died in 2013, taught for 40 years and she loved instructing young children on how to read and write.
Mr. Gillis reached out to his brothers Kevin and Adrian, who also live in Ontario, and suggested the siblings make a donation to the James McConnell Memorial Library in Sydney in honour of their mother.
They agreed and pooled together a $250,000 donation — $25,000 a year for 10 years. Most of the gift will be earmarked for books for five- to 12-year-olds, and the books will be circulated throughout Nova Scotia.
Adrian, Edward and Kevin in an undated photo.Kevin Gillis/Kevin Gillis
Shortly after his cancer diagnosis, Mr. Gillis enrolled in a clinical trial for a new treatment, called Car-T, that involves changing the body’s T-cells so they attack the cancer cells. The trial proved remarkably successful and he was in remission within a few months. Mr. Gillis said he feels so good that he leads bicycle tours around Ottawa. “I had lost the ability to walk for a while. I couldn’t really form sentences, couldn’t get thoughts out, but I would say I’m 99.5 per cent back to normal.”
On Sept. 6, Mr. Gillis and his brothers will be in Sydney to unveil a reading room in honour of their mom and to announce the Rita E. Gillis Children’s Literacy Fund, which will accept further donations.
“She used to say that life is a hard teacher. It gives you the test first and the lesson afterwards. She was always trying to give us the lesson first and the test afterwards,” he said.