John Carrigan never complains about aging
There was a time when his doctors weren’t sure he would live to turn 20.
He was only 16 years old, a high school sophomore and the football team’s star quarterback when he was diagnosed with testicular cancer in 1970. After surgery, doctors discovered a cancerous nodule on the lung, and he also was diagnosed with lymphoma. What gave him the courage to get through two years of intensive chemotherapy was knowing he could play football again.
Today he’s a high school football coach of a team that qualified for the 2009 state playoffs, a golf coach and chemistry teacher in Caldwell, Texas.
Carrigan has always been grateful to M. D. Anderson for saving his life. When he recovered from treatment and went to Southwest Texas State University in San Marcos, he initiated the Cancer Bowl, an annual football match between fraternity and non-fraternity young men. For 18 years, the popular event was a fundraiser for M. D. Anderson.
Investing in Making Cancer History®
Carrigan isn’t finished giving back to M. D. Anderson. Like a growing group of people, he and his wife, Janet, are leaving the institution an unrestricted gift in their will.
Planned giving is just one way of providing important support to M. D. Anderson’s mission of eliminating cancer. Many donors give through the Annual Fund, which underwrites projects such as the Physician-Scientist Program. And creating an endowed fund like the George and Barbara Bush Endowment for Innovative Cancer Research, which celebrated its 10th anniversary in 2009, provides support in perpetuity for research and other programs specified by the donor.
Annual events also are informative and fun ways to support M. D. Anderson. These festive affairs include the Volunteer Endowment for Patient Support luncheon, A Conversation With a Living Legend events and many others.
