John York

Who is John York?

John C. York is a retired American cancer research pathologist, married to Marie Denise DeBartolo York, and former co-owner and current co-chairman of the San Francisco 49ers. The Yorks have four children: sons Jed and Tony, and daughters Jenna and Mara.

York was born in Muskogee, Oklahoma. The son of a dentist who died when York was 15, York grew up in Little Rock and attended local schools until college. He graduated from the University of Notre Dame in South Bend in 1971. He received a doctorate in blood pathology from Stritch School of Medicine at Loyola University Chicago in 1975, and engaged in seven years of post-doctoral study, specializing in the laboratory diagnosis of lymphoma and leukemia.

York left academia to establish DeYor Laboratories in Boardman, Ohio, a partnership with his father-in-law, Edward J. DeBartolo Sr. In 1999, he sold DeYor Laboratories. York has made a number of contributions in the medical field, having given a $1.5 million contribution to establish an Endowed Chair in Pathology and an Endowed Chief Residency in Pathology at the University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences.