 So, dear colleagues, friends, and guests, today I come before you and it is a somewhat difficult task of offering a tribute to the professional accomplishments of my former boss, my mentor, my colleague, and my friend David Swanson. I say it's somewhat difficult in that it is a challenge to summarize the accomplishments of a lifetime of achievement in a few minutes with a few PowerPoint slides, but I'll do my best. First and foremost, let me say that this is not a eulogy. David is very much alive, but he's not well. He's had a significant decline in his health as of late to the point that he's basically homebound. He uses a wheelchair to get around and he's getting help from hospice for the many challenges associated with his declining health. He suffers both from the disease process of sarcoidosis and from the toxicity associated with treatment. From my perspective, he has the worst of all worlds. His mind is still very sharp and intact, but his body has failed him. He has progressive pulmonary disease and he's been turned down for a lung transplant. He's accepted his fate and realizes that it's just a question of time, yet he perseveres. He knows that I'm giving this tribute and is probably watching on YouTube, so I really better watch what I say from here on out. I want to talk a little bit about his life. David was born on the south side of Chicago. He received his undergraduate education at Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota. From there he moved on to Philadelphia to attend medical school at the University of Pennsylvania. After graduating from medical school, David moved to Torrance, California for his internship in one year of general surgery training at Harbor General Hospital. His journey in life was temporarily placed on hold while he served his country as a captain in the U.S. Army Medical Corps for one year in Vietnam, followed by one year in Fort MacArthur and San Pedro, California. David went on to do his urology residency at the University of California, Davis. In 1976, Dr. Swanson moved to Houston, Texas to do a fellowship in urologic oncology under the direction of Dr. Douglas E. Johnson. He was the first fellow in the Department of Urology ever. His focus was on immunology with a special focus on the treatment of kidney cancer. This is me with a picture of Doug Johnson, the first chairman of urology at M.D. Anderson. I actually have an endowed professorship in his name and he just passed away last year. He was a very enigmatic character from what I can gather. Many of you know the name of Willet Whitmore, who is the chair of urology at Sloan Kettering. He was very charismatic, very quotable and remains relevant to this day. He has a name lecture at SUO. Doug Johnson was his contemporary at M.D. Anderson. By all accounts, Dr. Johnson was a fantastic surgeon, took great care of patients, but his people skills and ability to promote himself were somewhat lacking, which is why most of you have never heard of him. From all I can gather, Dr. Swanson has a kind of love-hate relationship with him that I still don't understand. He was complicated, but suffice it to say, Dr. Johnson had a huge influence on David's approach to the treatment of cancer that he passed on to his trainees. It is notable to say that David spent his entire career at M.D. Anderson. He started off as the first trainee ever in the Department of Urology, doing a year of research in immunology as it related to kidney cancer, followed by a clinical year under the tutelage of Dr. Johnson. He culminated his career as our chairman for seven years, a tribute to his hard work, his mentorship, and the support of his family. From my perspective, this is the dynamic duo. David was the Robin to Andy's Batman. Andy had the big vision and saw the future. David was content to focus on the details of the day-to-day operations and made sure that the machine worked. Their collaborative relationship is directly responsible for why our program has grown to the stature that it is today and why our fellowship is so competitive. They complimented each other and made each other better. Of course, David is not just the professional dynamo that I've characterized to date. He, like all of us, had a better half that helped him be all he could be. He used to say to me, Chris, you know, I got married late in life. He was a longstanding bachelor and I'm sure it took some significant adjustments on his part to make life with another successful. Kareena is his anchor. His yang to her yang. She is in many ways like him, but enough different to make him interesting to her. And they found each other at a time that worked for them both. Along came their son, Eric. I don't know if he was a surprise or planned, but you can almost imagine. We'll look under that mask saying, what the hell have I done? It looks like David attended the birth between cases at MD Anderson. Eric has been their only child. And through the years, I've heard about the trials and tribulations, successes and failures. But overall, I believe David feels blessed with a wonderful son, and most recently, a fantastic daughter-in-law. Eric didn't choose a path in medicine, but rather journalism. My sense is he takes more after his mother than his father, much to everyone's relief. As David enters the twilight of his career, he, like I'm sure all of us, must sit back and reflect on his accomplishments. Did I have an impact? Did I make a difference? Has my life mattered? And I've heard from both Dr. Vanessa Mbak, as well as David himself, that he's concerned about his legacy, and whether or not his achievements make his life notable for success. You can see from this slide that he has certainly been a productive academic. But admittedly, these are just numbers. And as you can see from the next side that David sent me, which he thinks is hilarious, by the way, numbers could be made to show anything. It may not be a true representation of one's contribution in life. This is supposedly a real sign he found on a Colorado roadway. This is how I remember meeting Dr. Swanson my first day as an interview at MD Anderson. There were stacks all over his office, slides, magazines, papers, yet he was extremely organized and knew where everything was. The paper on the cork board was his life, organized down to the minute. He was warm and inviting to me, and I'm not going to lie, I was a bit intimidated. Here was this legend in urology sitting across from me, asking about my family and my future. In the interest of full disclosure, David did have a bit of a bark in the OR, but definitely no bite. He was a great surgeon, he demanded much of his trainees, and cared much for his patients. He was precise, detail-oriented, and expected us to be our best. I learned much from him that I continued to practice to this day, and I think that's actually a young Chris Evans working with him in the OR. He looks like he might even be happy to be there. This is one of my favorite pictures that I have in my office too this day. Talk about being surrounded by greatness. Dr. Novick and David were great friends and contemporaries. This was when Dr. Novick was our invited Van Eschenbach lecturer. Sadly, he passed away a couple of years later, but I'm still incredulous that I was selected by the KCA to give a lecture in his name. David was consistently voted one of the best doctors in America. He also was awarded the very prestigious Faculty Achievement Award by his peers at MD Anderson. This is a much sought after award by clinicians at MD Anderson as it represents recognized excellence in the care of patients by the very people you work alongside with. Here are the remarks that David made at his acceptance of the award, kind of odd that they would be typed up so fancy, but more about that later. He attended the ceremony with his mother and his family, truly a great day in his life when he was honored by those he worked with. Academic urology provided David the opportunity to travel the world and see things he never dreamed of. Here's an action photo when he was in his prime. Couldn't resist showing just a little bit of skin. He lived life to the fullest while he was still capable. Karine told me that David Bose, he's been to 37 countries all over the globe as a consequence of his international stature, a much sought after lecturer that cultivated international relationships. I learned from the best. I still struggle with the idea that he could possibly question his value and whether or not his life made a difference. I mean, look at these accomplishments. Deputy chairman, medical director, chairman, influencing the lives of so many fellows and residents that have gone on to greater glory. He gave authoritative lectures around the globe, many focused on advancing our knowledge on the treatment of kidney cancer. While it can be challenging to look at the breadth of one's work and contributions and identify the single most important contribution one made to the field, I have no doubt that David would hone in directly on what he must consider his crowning glory. He hired me. I must confess I have to laugh a little bit about that. It was actually Dr. Vaughn that promised me the job. He then promptly resigned as chair. David was under no obligation to hire me. I had no contract, no discussion of salary, nothing. And yet he honored that commitment and saw some value in me. He served us well as chairman and then after 29 years of his continuous service to MD Anderson, he retired. Here he is hugging the babes at his retirement party. Always the ladies' man. He bought a retirement home in the Blue Ridge Mountains on the border of North and South Carolina town called Glassie. He loves it there. It's his beloved retreat from the rest of the world. I must confess I was worried about him retiring. I never saw this David sleeping on a hammock, doing nothing, watching the world go by. I honestly didn't think he had it in him to relax and still be happy. Drinking his beloved wine, no, he doesn't own a vineyard, he'd drink all the profits and content to rest on his laurels. I was really worried that this inactivity would make him withdraw from the world and that his illness would progress and take him from us quickly. Well, thankfully no one could be more wrong than me. Unburdened by the pressures of command, he rallied. In collaboration with Steve Frank from the Department of Radiation Oncology, he reinvigorated our Breakey Therapy Program for prostate cancer and continued to be productive academically. But I would be remiss if I didn't give you some insight into the man behind the legend. These are some quotes that I still quote to the fellows to this day. I remember presenting a horrible case to him of a young patient with horrible disease, poor performance status, who was sent to me for side-reductive surgery and I agonized over whether or not the tumor was receptable and I wanted to do the right thing by the patient. His response, if you can't look good, why look bad? In the operating room, he was famous for saying things like, I think you might want to consider dissecting it this way or approaching a surgical problem in a certain way. Translation, do it my way or else. I remember going home and saying, can you believe this idiot flew all the way to Europe and only stayed 24 hours? Only to do it myself time and time again. I actually flew to Korea for less than 24 hours, a very dubious badge of honor. And I remember this quote from when I transitioned from fellow to attending. My response was of course, thank you Dr. Swanson. I think I can count the number of times I've called him David to his face on one or two hands. I just have too much respect for him to let that go. I'm gonna finish up with some Swansonisms. These are my observations of the man I've come to know and respect and yet still managed to make fun of. He is a total foodie and a total wine file. He's actually paying for the dinner with because he tries to savor every bite and it takes forever. He's a poker player and one of his favorite things to do was to fly to Vegas, play poker all night and then go to one of the fancy restaurants and entertain his foodie and wine file lifestyle. He actually had a shirt that said is there a hyphen and anal retentive. He is one of the most anal retentive guys I know. He had yellow stickies all over his office with all kinds of notes and yet he knew where everything was. He is the only person I know who wrote down, rehearsed his own spontaneous remarks. He's a stalker on clinic station. That's our electronic medical record. I literally could call him on Monday, Monday evening and he'd say to me, how was that second case? How did that go? I mean he watched everything. If he liked you, you could do no wrong. He didn't like you, you could do no right. So in conclusion, his legacy, he remained, he provided tremendous sentinel contributions to urologic oncology and kidney cancer in particular. He educated and trained the next generation of urologic oncologists. He gave selflessly of his time and energy to causes he believed in like the Kidney Cancer Association and he touched and saved the lives of thousands of patients. Oh yeah and he hired me. This is his email address. He would love it if you reached out to him. Don't feel sad for him. He's had a great life but he would love it if you communicated with him. So please join me in celebrating a great life and tremendous contributions of one of my heroes. Thank you.