David L. Hitchcock

September 20, 1950 - October 13, 2005

David Hitchcock Eulogy

It was twenty-three years ago. I was thirty-two. I had left EPA to try my hand at private practice. My first day at Richards, Harris & Medlock was full of the normal jitters—and frankly most of it is now a complete blur. But one thing stands out in my mind—about mid-morning, an associate who was around my age, sauntered into my office, sat down in a chair in a way that made it clear he planned to stay a while, and talked to me in a very different way from everyone else that day. He didn’t lob me a bunch of softball questions or spout empty platitudes about the firm. At first, it was downright disarming. Those of you who later worked for him as associates may have come to fear this technique. But I know the reason you are here today is that you came to recognize, as did I, that this was simply his engineer’s training of taking something apart in order to understand it. By the end of our conversation on that very first day at the firm, I knew that I had a friend.

God put me in David Hitchcock’s life, and he in mine, at a crucial juncture for both of us. For the next five years, he was my very best friend. Those of you who knew David and me during those days in the mid-1980s could not have imagined better casting for the Odd Couple—except that both of us kept house like Walter Matthau. I voted for George McGovern in 1972; David was a Marine. I was a city boy; David was definitely country. I never took a science class after Chemistry for Non-Science Majors; David was trained as a Chem E. To this day, I cannot tune an engine, fix a plumbing problem, even build a dog house; David knew how to do practically anything, and if he didn’t know how, he soon figured it out. I wrote poetry; David read operating manuals. 

David and I had a sort of ZEN AND THE ART OF MOTORCYCLE MAINTENANCE relationship that made no sense to anyone else. But looking back, I don’t know how either one of us could have made it through those five years without each other—through divorces and girlfriends, loneliness and heartache, and that overriding fear of making a mistake. Together, David and I felt our way along the walls of that dark cave of the soul. Both of us had a lot of adversity to overcome. In my case it was all self-inflicted; David's adversity, on the other hand, was genuine. David always listened to me, never judging, even when I would start off on one of my flights into pointless abstraction. Yet he also never allowed me to descend into self-pity. And I? I kept David focused on what a truly incredible person he was, never letting him get down on himself, making him even use the dreaded "F" word--yes, I made David talk about his feelings. 

The good news is that David and I finally saw the light—actually two lights—at the end of that cave. And those lights were named Jan and Frannie. Jan and I spent our honeymoon scuba diving in Cozumel with Dave and Frannie—we were unquestionably the four happiest people on the planet in July 1987. Yet, it was actually before that adventure, at David and Frannie’s wedding, that I realized David would never need to rely on me again. And that’s quite understandable. Have you ever seen anyone happier in your whole life than David was at his wedding? 

That wedding, incidentally, was in a Presbyterian Church, just as we are today. I too am a Presbyterian. All of which raises a burning theological question: "What is the difference between Presbyterians and the members of every other Christian denomination?" The answer: They each sin the same amount, but the Presbyterians haven’t learned to enjoy it yet. When he became a Presbyterian elder, apparently David never learned that part of the Westminster Confession because he truly enjoyed life the last twenty years.

I canvassed a number of you, and the stories are simply too numerous for our short time here today. But one that I must mention comes from Rich Beem, now practicing law in Chicago, about his time as a law clerk with David. David asked him to conduct a patentability search on a size 48J brassiere! David maintained a prototype of this bad boy in an endtable in his office. It was situated just so that when anyone would absentmindedly open up the cabinet, the subject clothing item would fall out. They would be rendered speechless, but David would deadpan as if nothing unusual had happened. 

I know all of us have an empty place in our hearts as David has crossed the Jordan, for we are left behind without his truly unusual sense of humor. Jan reminded me that one thing I loved about David was that he would laugh at my jokes--even if he was hearing them for the third or fourth time. And most importantly, Frannie asked me to tell all of you how much she loved David. The greatest tribute we can pay to Frannie, and to David, is to check-in on Frannie over the next year, because I know that Frannie feels like her heart has a tear in it the size of David’s adopted home state.

Still, I ask each of you to think about this: What an incredible joy it is to know that once Frannie arrived, David truly lived a full and abundant life. I honestly believe that David knew more happiness in the last twenty years than the rest of us will ever get to experience on this side of the gates of heaven. 

All of you know the brilliant result that David got in Kingsdown Medical v. Hollister, the inequitable conduct case before the Federal Circuit. I don’t know why God took David so unexpectedly last Thursday, October 13, but God must have had some major IP litigation up there, and he needed to retain the most ethical patent lawyer who was ever licensed. But it wasn't just brains or ethics. It was also loyalty. David was always there for me.

We all know that David was certainly funny, honest, reliable, and brilliant. But he was something much more. David loved his country. He loved dancing and welding and dogs and horses and scuba diving. He loved his friends. He loved Frannie—twenty years later, it was like they were still first dating. 

Those of you who knew David and me in those days in that dark cave, when we were searching for ourselves in Willie Nelson’s songs, long talks, bad jokes, and yes, in copious quantities of malt beverages, could not possibly have imagined that David and I would one day become Sunday School teachers. And over the last 15 years, I have gotten to know the Bible pretty well. I thought about referring you today to some obscure scripture, but Jan and I talked and we agreed that there is simply one tried and true passage from Corinthians that we all know that captures the very essence of David’s life. There are Bibles in the pews. Please follow with me as I read I Corinthians 13:4-8. 

“Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil but rejoices in the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres. Love never fails.”

David truly loved. In fact, if you substitute “David” for “love” in this passage, you will see that he was all these things. David committed his life to Christ, and he lived his faith. Even though we all believe that grace is the unmerited favor of God, David, more than anyone I ever knew, truly deserved those twenty years of happiness. 

And that, my friends, is the lesson we should take with us today. We surely should mourn David's death, but we must also celebrate David’s life. We can ponder all we want those great mysterious questions—“Why would someone with that much love leave us? Why did David die and not me? Why did he die now?” But those questions won’t be answered until we too have crossed to the other side of the Jordan. Instead, what we all must walk away with today is the answer to this question: “Was my life better because David Hitchcock was my friend?” Without a doubt, my friends, without a doubt. Because David Hitchcock was a blessing. We should all be so glad that God blessed us by putting David in our lives.

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