Striking back at cancer.(Knight Ridder Newspapers)

SAN JOSE, Calif. _ It's been a year since Dan Case underwent surgery for brain cancer _ a horrible, transforming year of treatments and occasional setbacks for one of Silicon Valley's most influential investment bankers.

It's been a gratifying year as well, he says, one in which he and his family launched a foundation to seek a cure for a disease that strikes 17,000 Americans each year, most of them children or, like the 44-year-old Case, adults in their prime.

It's been a year in which Case has had to face the grim statistics of his own particular form of cancer but has been buoyed by support for his efforts to do something about it.

``If there's one lesson I got from this, it's much more than `We have to fix brain cancer,' '' Case said. ``It's that people are amazing if you just give them a chance to be kind.''

In the first extended interview he's given since he announced he had the disease last April, Case was philosophical about his plight. While far from giving up hope, he is well aware of the odds against his beating the disease, but enthusiastic about his efforts to make a difference in the outcome, if not for himself, then for others. Although his energy flags now, he still shows the intelligence, humor and drive that brought him to the top of his profession and made him a wealthy man.

He retains the title of chairman of JPMorgan H&Q, the former Hambrecht & Quist, now folded into its much larger parent corporation. But since his surgery he's been working part time.

He's devoting much of his time to family _ the youngest of his ...