Michael Charles Tilden

Michael was born at the Naval Hospital in Annapolis Maryland. He was the first child of Captain Charles E. Tilden USN (ret) and his wife Helen M. Richmond. Michael's father, after serving as a PT boat pilot in World War II, made a career of service as a meteorologist for the Pacific fleet. Michael grew up in many ports of call throughout California, the Pacific and the East Coast. He learned tolerance and acceptance of all people. The only people he had problems with were bigots.

Everyone who met Michael knew, immediately, that he was a good soul. He had a dry sense of humor, stating the obvious and the ironic, but never at the expense of someone's feelings. He was quick to laugh and slow to anger. You could relax around Michael, he had no dark underlying agenda. No matter what the situation, if he said he had your back, he had your back. Brave and reasonable you could trust him in a clinch. He did not like conflict, but could handle it expertly. He was kind. He was cool. He told the truth. “A finer person there never was.” is the overwhelming consensus from all who knew him.

It was while the family was stationed in Carmel California, that Michael first fell in love with the sea. He learned to sail on El Estero Lake. in Monterey with members of his elementary school. Sailing became a passion that lasted his entire life. He crewed in the 1964 trials for the America's Cup Race on Narragansett Bay aboard the Nefertiti. As an adult he had his own 21' sailboat named the Volans which he sailed on California's lakes, the delta and the open Pacific. It was during a trip to the Channel Island on the Volans that Michael proved his skill as a sailor and his unflappable courage. Gail force winds and high seas were pushing the boat out to sea when the engine failed. Michael opened the fuel line on the engine with the barrel of a BIC pen and spent the next six hours at the rudder. All three of the “crew” of friends knew that he had saved their lives and always called him “captain”.

Michael's vocation and avocation was photography. It was while he attended the University of Delaware as a Mechanical Engineering student, in 1963, that he began taking photos. He was never without a camera after that. In 1964 Michael returned to Fresno where both of his parents had grown up. He transferred to CSUF to continue his education.

In 1967/1968, he heard a different call. He and his cousin Dan moved to San Francisco and settled into a hotel on Stanyan Street, where Stanyan meets Haight. A good time was had by all so they say but no one can give the details. Michael and Dan spent their days hustling for rent money and their nights at Winterland Ballroom and The Fillmore. But as well as selling the Berkeley Barb on the streets of Haight Ashbury, Michael was looking for a photography job. He found one as the darkroom technician at Sunset Magazine in Menlo Park and worked there from 1967 till 1970. Being the youngest staff member, the test kitchen ladies made sure he was well fed.

He returned to Fresno in 1970 and in 1974 received his Master of Arts, with distinction at CSUF. That year he also co-founded the Spectrum Art Gallery for Fine Art Photography in Fresno. He worked as the slide librarian at CSUF's Art Department and did free-lance jobs in architecture photography. One of his free-lance jobs took him to Valley Medical Center, where he became their on-call photographer. In 1984 this lead to a permanent position, with The University of California, San Francisco Medical Education Program in Fresno, as a medical photographer. He was assigned to the VA Hospital's Medical Media Department where the friendships made became life long.

While at UCSF-Fresno Michael also worked as video technician and content editor. During fundraising galas Michael worked with people of note in various fields, among them Dick Cavett, Richard Leakey, Cokie Roberts and Fred Friendly to name only a handful. Michael's easy-going rapport and professionalism made an impression on each person, as was reflected in their comments about the program. During this time, Michael also met his wife Paula. They were married in 1995. Michael became supervisor of the Educational Graphic Arts Department (EGAD) in the mid-1990s and he and Paula retired, on the same day in 2005, to embark on world travels.

Michael was a builder of finely crafted places to dwell. You could not tell Michael that he couldn't accomplish these building projects, the sound of his hammer drown you out. With no formal training and single-handed he built a geodesic dome in the 1970s and from 2007 until 2014 he worked to add a second story to a 1918 Craftsman Bungalow. The bungalow was to become his home with Paula. He also did a complete, historical restoration, of the original rooms. There was nothing that he could not build, nothing in building that he could not do. One inspector, when signing off, called the completed job “sanitary”. People from the neighborhood often said they knew something had been done to the Craftsman, but could not quite place what. The fact that there was a new, full second story was overlooked because the seamless work looked like it had always been there.

Builder, sailor, photographer, golfer, explorer, friend. These are just a few brief highlights of a life well lived. Michael came to his faith in Christ later in life and after many years of struggle against “organized” religion. He knew that he was blessed and responded with gratitude and humility. In the end his trust was in the salvation provided by God through Christ and in no other. He picked his own epitaph as an expression of his belief.

“Friends do not weep. I belong to Christ and in Him I sleep.”

He is survived by his wife Paula Coffman Tilden, sisters Mary Poulos and Ellen Hasson, brother Mark Tilden, two nephews and eight nieces.

A memorial service will be held on Tuesday, June 7 2022, at 10 AM. - St. Michael the Archangel Anglican Church - 5073 N Palm Ave. Fresno at the corner of Palm and Shaw Ave across from Fig Garden Village.