St. Jude CEOs have played a central role in shaping the institution from its earliest days through decades of growth and discovery. Early executive leadership helped translate the founding vision into a functioning research hospital, establishing governance structures and scientific priorities that would guide the organization for years to come.
Each CEO has built on the work of those before them, adapting to advances in science, medicine, and health care while maintaining a steady focus on the mission. Together, these leaders have supported continuity in stewardship and direction as St. Jude has expanded its research, strengthened patient care, and increased its global impact.
Donald Pinkel, MD
President and Chief Executive Officer
1961 – 1973
Dr. Donald Pinkel served as the first director of St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, focusing on acute lymphoblastic leukemia (ALL), the most frequent cancer in young children, he and his colleagues identified four major obstacles to its cure: drug resistance, drug toxicity, meningeal relapse and most important, pessimism.
They began “Total Therapy” in 1962, a multi-drug treatment program combining chemotherapy with radiation and intrathecal medicine. The cure rate increased from 4% to 50% in the 1967–68 Total Therapy V study. This was the first significant cure rate for generalized cancer and for the primarily drug treatment of cancer. This four-phase treatment plan is still used, and the reported cure rates have increased to 94% for children with ALL treated at St. Jude.
Read more about his revolutionary work
Watch Dr. Pinkel's Gallery of Pioneers video
Alvin Mauer, MD
President and Chief Executive Officer
1973 – 1983
Dr. Alvin Mauer served as the second director of St. Jude and focused on growing the institution Dr. Pinkel had built. Under his leadership, St. Jude doubled in size and added a $10.5 million research building. Mauer strongly encouraged and strengthened the collaborative relationship between scientists and clinicians as the hospital expanded.
Importantly, he launched the hospital's Affiliate Program, creating St. Jude clinics in other cities so that more children could receive care closer to home. His work grew St. Jude from a single Memphis campus into a national network committed to curing childhood cancer.
Watch Dr. Mauer's Gallery of Pioneers video
Learn about the Affiliate Program
Joseph V. Simone, MD
President and Chief Executive Officer
1983 – 1992
Dr. Joseph Simone served as the third director of St. Jude. He joined the hospital in 1967 as a faculty physician. He chaired the Department of Hematology and served as associate director for Clinical Research. During his tenure, Simone focused on building St. Jude into an institution that not only treated cancer, but studied its long-term effects and shaped national standards for cancer care.
Simone increased research programs, launched an HIV/AIDS clinical program, and created one of the world's largest long-term follow-up clinics for childhood cancer survivors. He brought scientific attention to St. Jude by entering the Pediatric Oncology Group in 1981 and later paved the way for the institution to be a charter member of the National Comprehensive Cancer Network.
Discover more about his ground-breaking achievements
Watch Dr. Simone's Gallery of Pioneers video
Arthur W. Nienhuis, MD
President and Chief Executive Officer
1993 – 2004
Dr. Arthur W. Nienhuis served as fourth director and CEO of St. Jude and led a transformative era of scientific growth and institutional expansion. Nienhuis positioned St. Jude at the forefront of genetic medicine by recruiting leading scientists and department chairs to strengthen programs in hematology, gene therapy, infectious diseases, developmental neurobiology, structural biology, and pediatric oncology, including pediatric brain tumors.
Nienhuis oversaw the hospital's first $1 billion expanion, adding a research tower, an on-campus patient housing facility, and the Children's GMP facility that produces gene therapy vectors, antibodies, and vaccines. His leadership contributed to groundbreaking advances, including a cure for SCID-X1 and transformative gene therapy treatments for hemophilia B.
Learn more about his life and legacy
Watch Dr. Pinkel's Gallery of Pioneers video
William E. Evans, PharmD
President and Chief Executive Officer
2004 – 2014
Dr. William E. Evans served as the fifth director and CEO of St. Jude. Under his leadership, St. Jude expanded its research to include Chemical Biology and Therapeutics, Epidemiology and Cancer Control, and new technologies to further understand the genomic basis of childhood cancers and to develop individualized approaches to cancer treatment.
Evans oversaw major institutional achievements, including St. Jude becoming the first and only National Cancer Institute-designated Comprehensive Cancer Center devoted solely to children in 2008 and launching the landmark Pediatric Cancer Genome Project in 2010.
Learn more about Dr. Evans
Watch Dr. Evans' Gallery of Pioneers video
If not St. Jude, then who?
James R. Downing, MD
President & CEO
James R. Downing, MD
President and Chief Executive Officer
2014 – present
Dr. James R. Downing is the sixth and current CEO of St. Jude. He is leading a $12.9 billion commitment to accelerate progress in the research and treatment of pediatric cancer and other catastrophic diseases. This strategy includes expanding St. Jude clinical care and scientific programs in Memphis and around the globe; adding 2,300 jobs; providing $2.3 billion in new construction, renovation and capital needs; and opening new areas of research.
Dr. Downing has been a driving force to take St. Jude to the world. He has championed an expansive program to raise pediatric cancer survival rates internationally. This is being accomplished in part through a global alliance of health care providers who work to ensure children everywhere have access to quality care.
Under Dr. Downing’s tenure, St. Jude has been highly rated for its organizational culture by Glassdoor and Fortune magazine. The institution has received numerous accolades as a top workplace for millennials, a best workplace for diversity and a destination workplace for women.
Gallery of Pioneers
Inside the Danny Thomas Research Center, one of our earliest dedicated research spaces, is the Gallery of Pioneers — a tribute to the leaders, visionaries and pioneers whose commitment helped build St. Jude into what it is today.
The lobby is lined with portraits of some of the scientists, clinicians and leaders who shaped our history and advanced our mission across decades. At the center of it all, a bronze bust of St. Jude founder Danny Thomas stands as a symbole of the founding promise that set everything in motion.
The Gallery of Pioneers is a virtual experience, accessible to anyone who wants to explore the people and ideas that have defined St. Jude.
More to discover
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Leadership at St. Jude
St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital and ALSAC, its fundraising and awareness organization, are guided by teams of esteemed leaders.
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History of St. Jude
Explore the history of St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital, from Danny Thomas’s founding vision to groundbreaking discoveries and global impact in childhood cancer research.
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Danny Thomas
Discover how entertainer Danny Thomas founded St. Jude Children’s Research Hospital and built a lasting legacy of hope for kids with cancer and other life-threatening diseases.
