Dr. David F. Hardwick was born in Vancouver, British Columbia in 1934 into an extended family of educators, artists, writers and performers (big surprise?). He received his education through medical school in Vancouver, graduating from The University of British Columbia (UBC) in 1957. After interning in Montreal and Charlotte, NC he returned to Vancouver for a year as a Pediatric Resident then on to Pediatric Pathology in Los Angeles. He won a NIH traineeship for two years in Developmental Neurophysiology at LA Children's, finally returning to Vancouver as a Pathology Resident III trainee and Head, Division of Pediatric Pathology in 1963.

Dr. Hardwick researched Wilms' Tumors and was the first to postulate a relationship between phenotype and survival. Between 1959 and 1962 he worked with the late G.A. Misrahy, one of the creators of the Clark oxygen electrode, studying vasomotion effects on extracellular oxygenation in neonatal and adult animals and developed a career long fascination with the phenomenon. His last graduate student Dr. D. Karkan obtained her Ph.D. in 2002 working on aspects of vasomotion in tumors. He then defined the pathogenesis of methionine toxicity through intracellular ATP depletion and explored other hepatotoxic phenomena. In 1965 he joined the University of British Columbia and created the UBC Pediatric Pathology Program, one of the flagship programs in Pathology at UBC. Between 1974 and 1989 he was Head, Department of Pathology, The University of British Columbia and built a teaching and research power house, the second largest research department at The University of British Columbia, itself a large international research University.

In the mid 1970's Dr. Nathan Kaufman invited Dr. Hardwick to sit on the USCAP Education Committee. He shortly became Chair and then moved onto Council, through the executive ranks working with numerous USCAP members to build the Educational perspective of the

Academy as a `Forum' for collegial exchange with free flow of information. After a successful Presidency he moved to the IAP where he became President in 1994. He and Antonio Llombart-Bosch reconfigured intercongress programs and with Dr. Cecila Fenoglio-Preiser began the process of creating a suitable operations infrastructure for the IAP after the spin off of the International Divisions. While working on these initiatives he created an endowed visiting scholar program to the Hong Kong IAP in collaboration with Dr. Joseph Lee then Head of Pathology at the Chinese University of Hong Kong and Director of the Hong Kong Summer School of Pathology. After many years of successful operation this has transformed into the preeminent Association of Directors of Pathology of China. The annual meeting has continued the sponsorship from the UBC IAP scholar program in addition to the Hong Kong IAP and others making a major contribution to Pathology education in China and Hong Kong.

In 1970 Dr. Hardwick was elected Chief of Medical Staff and Chair, Medical Advisory Committee of BC's Children's Hospital, a position held for 17 years. During that period he and the Head of Pediatrics, the late Sydney Israels, spearheaded the creation of and construction of a new combined Pediatric and Obstetric Hospital that opened in 1982. He worked with Professor A.J. Tingle to create a major Research Institute at the Children's and Women's campus. He currently sits on the Boards of the Research Institute and the BC's Children's Hospital Foundation where he is a `Circle of Care member'. Dr. Hardwick is Chair of B.C. Transplant Foundation that supports the BC Transplant Research Institute and was a Founding Board Member of the B.C. Women's Hospital and its Foundation.

During the late 1960's and early 1970's Dr. Hardwick and his brother, Professor Walter Hardwick, an urban geographer at UBC formed a political party with 24 friends. Over a six year period the party, The Electors Action Movement, took over governance of the City of Vancouver and redesigned the zoning, space use, neighborhood structures and aspects of the traffic and road system. Redevelopment of `False Creek' from a polluted, inner city disaster into one of Canada's preeminent living and recreation areas was a major achievement. Dr. Hardwick served as Chair, Selection Committee for city councillors for the party for 3 civic elections. When the task was complete, in1972 both he and his brother, then an elected councillor quit politics and moved onto other challenges.

Dr. Hardwick has received numerous awards including the Queen Elizabeth II Silver Medal, the IAP Gold Medal, William Boyd Lecturer of the Canadian Association of Pathologists, Honorary Doctor of Laws, UBC 2002 the Sydney Farber lecture of the Society for Pediatric Pathology as well as numerous awards for teaching including the Master Teacher award of UBC. Recently the Medical Students of UBC awarded Dr. Hardwick the "Just Desserts" Award for his contributions to students and in 1998 the Board of Governors of UBC named the main hall of the Medical Student & Alumni Centre after Dr. Hardwick as ` Hardwick Hall'.