Nick Swyka

The oldest of eight siblings, Nick was raised on a farm outside Middletown, Delaware, and grew up both working in and enjoying the great outdoors. He hunted ducks, geese, and pheasant from an early age, a lifelong passion that later in Texas grew to embrace dove and especially quail hunting with friends and family. Growing up, he worked on both his and nearby farms and in the machine and woodworking shop with his father. Nick was the first in his family to graduate college with a degree from the University of Delaware. Following a financial role in New York City, he pursued his education further with an MBA from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Upon achieving his MBA, he went to work with Arthur Andersen in Atlanta for 7 years, where he met the love of his life, Shannon Norman Swyka. Married in 1976, they celebrated their 48th wedding anniversary in April of this year.

Nick happened to be on a business trip to Houston in 1977 when he met two gentlemen who would change his career and life. Brothers Matt and L.E. Simmons had recently started a specialized energy investment bank in Houston, and Nick at this time agreed to join them as the sixth employee of Simmons & Co., International. Here he found his true calling for his career, becoming a trusted advisor for many energy industry leaders through the next 42 years until his retirement in 2019, after serving as Vice Chairman, Co-Head of Investment Banking, and a member of the Board of Directors for Simmons & Co. Throughout many industry cycles, mergers, acquisitions, and capital raises, he found something even more rewarding than his work – many of the closest friends of his life, both from within Simmons & Co. and at many of the clients he served.

In 1979, Nick welcomed the birth of his only child, Nicholas Lew Swyka, III. He enjoyed teaching his son how to hunt and work equipment on his 3 Bar S Ranch in South Texas, and later did the same for his grandsons, Nicholas Lew Swyka IV (“Cole”) and Hudson Pipkin Swyka, as well as be a doting grandfather to his granddaughter, Reese Marie Swyka. Together with his beloved daughter-in-law, Jennifer Pipkin Swyka, they celebrate his life today with Shannon, brothers Richard and John, sisters Barbara, Joyce, Theresa, and Ginny, and his many beloved nieces, nephews, and other relatives. He is preceded into everlasting life by his parents Nick Sr. and Mildred and his brother Steve Swyka.

As his friends both enjoyed and sometimes feared, Nick always derived great satisfaction from challenging himself through adventurous and occasionally dangerous quests across the wildest corners of the earth. He climbed to the summit of Mt. Kilimanjaro with his family in 1998 along with his treasured friends the Wood family. Nick also summited Mt. Shasta, the Half Dome at Yellowstone National Park, and numerous “14’ers” around Colorado. He also enjoyed motorcycling, both across the open West on road bikes and over treacherous mountain passes on off-road bikes, clad in thoroughly scuffed-up and oft-shattered head-to-toe protection. Through this passion, he fondly remembered special trips with friends and family biking across the Alps, coastal California, New Zealand, Big Bend, the Rockies, and the Baja 500 course in Mexico. The multiple broken bones along the way were reminders that nothing worth pursuing for Nick was ever done easily. In his slightly less hazardous trips, Nick greatly enjoyed skiing, hiking, and his years of treasured wing-shooting excursions with great friends to Argentina, the UK, Spain, and especially pursuing his cherished quail in South Texas. When the day’s adventure was through, Nick invariably enjoyed the camaraderie of great friends over a glass of wine by a fire pit or a roaring hearth. He was fortunate to retain his good health and athletic zeal until recently, and his dry humor and sharp wit stayed with him until the end.

Nick also served his community and industry across multiple other board roles both community and corporate. While seldom mistaken for a gifted dancer himself, Nick contributed his talents and resources for many years to the Houston Ballet, serving as President and later Chairman of the Board while shepherding the Ballet through growth and leadership transition. He enjoyed his numerous close friends and organizations at First Presbyterian Church, River Oaks Country Club, the St. Charles Bay Club, the Tejas Breakfast Club, the Telluride Ski and Golf Club, and his regular lunch, golf, and hunting buddies.

A memorial service honoring and celebrating Nick’s life and his passage to his loving savior Jesus Christ is to be conducted at ten o’clock in the morning on Tuesday, the 14th of January 2025, in the sanctuary of First Presbyterian Church, 5300 Main Street in Houston. Immediately following the service, all are invited to greet the family during a reception at a venue to be announced during the service.

In lieu of customary remembrances, those wishing to honor Nick’s memory are invited to consider memorial contributions be directed to Caesar Kleberg Wildlife Research Institute, 1125 West Avenue B Howe Bldg #159, Kingsville, TX 78363, The Michael J. Fox Foundation for Parkinson’s Research, Grand Central Station P.O. Box 4777, New York, NY 10163, the Houston Ballet, 500 Texas Ave, Houston, TX 77002, Wounded Warrior Project, ATTN: Advance Guard, P.O Box 758518, Topeka, KS 66675; or the charity of one’s choice.

Please visit Nick’s online memorial tribute at GeoHLewis.com where memories and words of comfort and condolence may be shared electronically with his family.