Chuck Kilbride refused to let a stroke keep him from the toy drive he has led for more than three decades.
Kilbride, 73, a retired USMC Major and Long Island native, suffered a stroke last October that left him with aphasia, a brain disorder that impairs the ability to speak, understand, read and write. He showed up Wednesday at Miller’s Ale House in Levittown anyway, helping hand out toys to children from Hempstead alongside the volunteers he has rallied since the 1990s.
“Altogether, it’s probably been over 2 million [toys],” Kilbride said of the number of trinkets he has given out across his career.
County government officials honored him during the event, pointing to his decades of commitment and his refusal to step back as proof he remains a role model for the community.
“He [just] wants to make sure all these kids are happy for the holiday season,” Toys For Tots co-chairman Sean Acosta, who helped lead the honors, told The Post.
“He wants to make sure he puts a smile on every one of these kids’ faces — he collects the toys — [but] he never takes recognition, and that’s why this year we’re recognizing him,” Acosta said.
Kilbride first enlisted in 1971 and served 27 years in the Marines. He took charge of Nassau County’s Toys For Tots almost immediately after retiring, eventually earning a place in the New York State Veterans Hall of Fame. The next three decades became a blur of rallying donors, recruiting volunteers and pressing local officials to keep the annual drive growing.
After last year’s stroke, some around him expected him to pull back. He did the opposite.
“He is relentless, determined. He doesn’t quit,” his daughter, retired Army Captain Kate Hiebert, 52, told The Post.
“Toys for Tots became a mechanism for him to coordinate the generosity of everyone else to give to the next generation of kids, and I think also to teach them that there are people who care, and that this is the way you can give,” she said.
When officials and longtime colleagues began singing his praises Wednesday, Kilbride turned the credit back on them just as quickly. Acosta was not surprised.
“That’s the Marines,” Acosta said. “He keeps going no matter what.”