May 5, 2026 • 10 mins
On first blush, most of us say we’d like to live forever. But how far are you willing to go? How about freezing your body cryogenically so it can be resuscitated decades from now? The first guy did that almost 60 years ago. Folks like PayPal founder Peter Thiel have signed on, as have Britney Spears and Paris Hilton. But the big question is... what happens when you wake up? You’re a time traveler with no way back...
Feel free to DM me if you have a story you’d like me to cover. On Facebook it’s Patty Steele and on Instagram Real Patty Steele.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Well, and all the lot of us human beings are
a little bit obsessed with death. Some of us are
fascinated by the possibilities of the afterlife, some are terrified,
and some think this one life is all there is.
But there's another subset folks who believe that if a
body is properly frozen cryogenically, you could return to life
(00:22):
once science has found a way to resuscitate you and
fix whatever took you out. Oh, unless you think folks
that choose the frozen path are just whack jobs, consider
the big names who signed on, like late baseball great
Ted Williams and still living folks like PayPal billionaire Peter Teel,
Britney Spears, and Paris Hilton. I'm Patty Steele. Freezing your
(00:44):
head off, literally, that's next on the backstory. The backstory
is back. No matter how fabulous your life is, how
much money, beauty and stuff you have, there's one thing
you can't do anything about, your expiration date, or can you.
(01:04):
Let's take a look at some people who decided to
risk a lot of money and maybe their reputations by
paying to have their entire body, or just their head
or even just their brain frozen at the moment of
death cryogenically preserved. It's a precise process, and one guy
was the first to try it out. Okay, let's go back.
(01:24):
It's January twelfth, nineteen sixty seven. The room is unnaturally quiet.
A small group of men look down on a lifeless body,
and they get busy, moving as fast and carefully as
they can. Ice is packed around the man's still warm.
Corpse tubes are inserted. Now chemicals begin flowing through the
(01:45):
veins that just moments ago were filled with life blood.
The dead man's name is James Bedford, but the people
in that room, as well as Bedford himself in life,
are convinced his life isn't over. He simply hit the
pause button. Bedford was a psychology professor. People who knew
him say he was a completely rational guy, not a wacko.
(02:09):
But like a lot of folks in the nineteen sixties,
he was captivated by a radical new idea that blurred
the line between science and science fiction. The idea, what
if death wasn't permanent? How about if instead of getting
buried or cremated, you could preserve the human body at
(02:29):
super low temperatures, literally freezing it in time until sometime
in the future science had advanced enough to bring you
back and fix what took you out. Nobody had ever
tried it on a human being before until Bedford. He
was dying of cancer and doctors said there was nothing
more they could do, no question, his life was over.
(02:51):
But Bedford saw something they didn't, a tiny sliver, almost
an impossible chance, not just to avoid death, but outweighed,
Bedford signed the papers to become the first human sent
into a state of cryogenic preservation. So on that January day,
as his heart stopped, a whole different process began. His
(03:14):
body was cooled with ice. Immediately, blood was replaced with
chemical preservatives. Then he was sealed inside a container filled
with liquid nitrogen nearly three hundred and twenty degrees below zero.
At that temperature, biological processes don't just slow down, they stop.
Cells freeze in place. Time for Professor Bedford was effectively
(03:38):
paused for decades. Cryonics was dismissed as fringe science. Critics
called it false hope, a fantasy for people unable to
accept the possibility of death. They had a point. There
was and still is, no proven way to bring a
frozen human being back to life. It's never been done.
But the thing is, science didn't stand still. As those
(04:01):
decades passed, technology advanced in labs around the world. Researchers
began solving pieces of the puzzle. They learned how to
freeze and successfully thaw human embryos, then organs, then small
tissues without destroying them. As for Bedford, he remains frozen,
with technicians checking on him from time to time, refilling
(04:24):
the liquid nitrogen, maintaining the proper temperatures, just waiting. Think
about that. A guy who's been dead since nineteen sixty
seven still has caretakers. He still exists in a kind
of strange in between state, not truly gone yet not alive.
But you know what, He's not alone. There are more
(04:44):
than five hundred folks now who've climbed on board that ship.
Some had their whole body preserved, some just their head,
and a handful just their brain. Baseball legend Ted Williams
died in two thousand and two and his son passed
in four Both had their heads cryogenically preserved, and Ted's
youngest daughter plans to do the same. Dick Claire, the
(05:08):
TV producer, writer and actor who created Facts of Life
and Mamma's Family and wrote for TV hits like Ed Sullivan,
Carol Burnett, Mary Tyler Moore Show, and Bob Newhart Show.
Was also cryo preserved after dying from AIDS. In nineteen
eighty eight, Hustler magazine publisher Larry Flint made plans to
be frozen, with the hope that when brought back to life,
(05:30):
they'd also restore his ability to walk. He'd been shot
years earlier, but after his death five years ago, there's
been no confirmation of Flint actually being frozen, and there
are a number of well known people who are still
alive but ready to be frozen at death, including billionaire
PayPal founder Peter Teel, socialite slash influencer Paris Hilton and
(05:52):
her two puppies, Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane, and Britney Spears,
who paid two hundred thousand dollars for the full body
cry on a preservation treatment. Even Simon Cowell has talked
quite a few times about his interest in it, and
David Pieser, a multimillionaire resort owner in Arizona, not only
has paid to have himself, his wife and their dogs
(06:13):
frozen after death, he's even set up a financial investment plan,
leaving his reanimated self ten million dollars, which over decades
could turn into multimillions or even billions should he awaken.
And that makes an interesting point. Who pays for the
ongoing freezing expense over all those decades as well as
(06:34):
the re animation expense? Should you get that far if
you wake up, would you have to repay your life
insurance pay out from your death? Could you reclaim your assets?
But here's the really big question. What happens at long last?
If this actually works? I mean, seriously think about it.
What if decades from now, maybe fifty or one hundred years,
(06:57):
science reaches a breakthrough. They have a cure, not just
for Professor Bedford's cancer and other folks fatal ailments, but
for the freezing process itself. They begin the reversal, and somehow,
against all odds, the heart starts beating again. Honestly, not
just who, but what wakes up? Because Bedford didn't just
(07:18):
leave behind a body, He left behind a whole world.
In nineteen sixty seven, there were no personal computers, no internet,
no smartphones. The moon landing hadn't even happened yet. Now
imagine opening your eyes into a world of artificial intelligence,
digital identities and realities that exist entirely online. How do
(07:40):
you even process that? And everybody you've ever known is
already gone, all your cultural references, everything normal to you,
every expectation erased and replaced. You are, in every way
a time traveler with no way back. So the question
is not just can we bring somebody back, but should we?
(08:04):
Who would this person even be? What would their life consist?
Of those five hundred plus frozen bodies are simply waiting,
betting on a future that may never pay off. Really,
what makes this story so powerful is that it isn't
really about science. It's about being human, refusing to accept
(08:24):
the finality of death. The belief, however, slim, that tomorrow
might hold answers that today does not. Professor Bedford didn't
know if it would work, but he took the long shot,
and nearly sixty years later, he's still waiting on ice,
somewhere between what was and what might be. So the
(08:46):
next time you have those existential thoughts about the future,
about what might eventually be possible, remember this Somewhere in
a chamber filled with liquid nitrogen, a man from nineteen
sixty seven is still sort of holding on waiting, and
one day we may find out if that wait was
(09:08):
worth it. Hope you're enjoying The Backstory with Patty Steele.
Please leave a review and follow or subscribe for free
to get new episodes delivered automatically. Also feel free to
dm me if you have a story you'd like me
to cover. On Facebook, It's Patty Steele and on Instagram
Real Patty Steele. I'm Patty Steele. The Backstory is a
(09:38):
production of iHeartMedia, Premiere Networks, the Elvis Duran Group, and
Steel Trap Productions. Our producer is Mike Pieseglia. Our writer
is Jake Kushner. New episodes are out every Tuesday and Friday,
and feel free to reach out to me with comments
and story suggestions on Instagram at reel Patty Steele and
on Facebook at Patty Steele. Thanks for listening to the
(09:59):
back Story with Patty Steele. The pieces of history you
didn't know you needed to know.
Well, and all the lot of us human beings are
a little bit obsessed with death. Some of us are
fascinated by the possibilities of the afterlife, some are terrified,
and some think this one life is all there is.
But there's another subset folks who believe that if a
body is properly frozen cryogenically, you could return to life
(00:22):
once science has found a way to resuscitate you and
fix whatever took you out. Oh, unless you think folks
that choose the frozen path are just whack jobs, consider
the big names who signed on, like late baseball great
Ted Williams and still living folks like PayPal billionaire Peter Teel,
Britney Spears, and Paris Hilton. I'm Patty Steele. Freezing your
(00:44):
head off, literally, that's next on the backstory. The backstory
is back. No matter how fabulous your life is, how
much money, beauty and stuff you have, there's one thing
you can't do anything about, your expiration date, or can you.
(01:04):
Let's take a look at some people who decided to
risk a lot of money and maybe their reputations by
paying to have their entire body, or just their head
or even just their brain frozen at the moment of
death cryogenically preserved. It's a precise process, and one guy
was the first to try it out. Okay, let's go back.
(01:24):
It's January twelfth, nineteen sixty seven. The room is unnaturally quiet.
A small group of men look down on a lifeless body,
and they get busy, moving as fast and carefully as
they can. Ice is packed around the man's still warm.
Corpse tubes are inserted. Now chemicals begin flowing through the
(01:45):
veins that just moments ago were filled with life blood.
The dead man's name is James Bedford, but the people
in that room, as well as Bedford himself in life,
are convinced his life isn't over. He simply hit the
pause button. Bedford was a psychology professor. People who knew
him say he was a completely rational guy, not a wacko.
(02:09):
But like a lot of folks in the nineteen sixties,
he was captivated by a radical new idea that blurred
the line between science and science fiction. The idea, what
if death wasn't permanent? How about if instead of getting
buried or cremated, you could preserve the human body at
(02:29):
super low temperatures, literally freezing it in time until sometime
in the future science had advanced enough to bring you
back and fix what took you out. Nobody had ever
tried it on a human being before until Bedford. He
was dying of cancer and doctors said there was nothing
more they could do, no question, his life was over.
(02:51):
But Bedford saw something they didn't, a tiny sliver, almost
an impossible chance, not just to avoid death, but outweighed,
Bedford signed the papers to become the first human sent
into a state of cryogenic preservation. So on that January day,
as his heart stopped, a whole different process began. His
(03:14):
body was cooled with ice. Immediately, blood was replaced with
chemical preservatives. Then he was sealed inside a container filled
with liquid nitrogen nearly three hundred and twenty degrees below zero.
At that temperature, biological processes don't just slow down, they stop.
Cells freeze in place. Time for Professor Bedford was effectively
(03:38):
paused for decades. Cryonics was dismissed as fringe science. Critics
called it false hope, a fantasy for people unable to
accept the possibility of death. They had a point. There
was and still is, no proven way to bring a
frozen human being back to life. It's never been done.
But the thing is, science didn't stand still. As those
(04:01):
decades passed, technology advanced in labs around the world. Researchers
began solving pieces of the puzzle. They learned how to
freeze and successfully thaw human embryos, then organs, then small
tissues without destroying them. As for Bedford, he remains frozen,
with technicians checking on him from time to time, refilling
(04:24):
the liquid nitrogen, maintaining the proper temperatures, just waiting. Think
about that. A guy who's been dead since nineteen sixty
seven still has caretakers. He still exists in a kind
of strange in between state, not truly gone yet not alive.
But you know what, He's not alone. There are more
(04:44):
than five hundred folks now who've climbed on board that ship.
Some had their whole body preserved, some just their head,
and a handful just their brain. Baseball legend Ted Williams
died in two thousand and two and his son passed
in four Both had their heads cryogenically preserved, and Ted's
youngest daughter plans to do the same. Dick Claire, the
(05:08):
TV producer, writer and actor who created Facts of Life
and Mamma's Family and wrote for TV hits like Ed Sullivan,
Carol Burnett, Mary Tyler Moore Show, and Bob Newhart Show.
Was also cryo preserved after dying from AIDS. In nineteen
eighty eight, Hustler magazine publisher Larry Flint made plans to
be frozen, with the hope that when brought back to life,
(05:30):
they'd also restore his ability to walk. He'd been shot
years earlier, but after his death five years ago, there's
been no confirmation of Flint actually being frozen, and there
are a number of well known people who are still
alive but ready to be frozen at death, including billionaire
PayPal founder Peter Teel, socialite slash influencer Paris Hilton and
(05:52):
her two puppies, Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane, and Britney Spears,
who paid two hundred thousand dollars for the full body
cry on a preservation treatment. Even Simon Cowell has talked
quite a few times about his interest in it, and
David Pieser, a multimillionaire resort owner in Arizona, not only
has paid to have himself, his wife and their dogs
(06:13):
frozen after death, he's even set up a financial investment plan,
leaving his reanimated self ten million dollars, which over decades
could turn into multimillions or even billions should he awaken.
And that makes an interesting point. Who pays for the
ongoing freezing expense over all those decades as well as
(06:34):
the re animation expense? Should you get that far if
you wake up, would you have to repay your life
insurance pay out from your death? Could you reclaim your assets?
But here's the really big question. What happens at long last?
If this actually works? I mean, seriously think about it.
What if decades from now, maybe fifty or one hundred years,
(06:57):
science reaches a breakthrough. They have a cure, not just
for Professor Bedford's cancer and other folks fatal ailments, but
for the freezing process itself. They begin the reversal, and somehow,
against all odds, the heart starts beating again. Honestly, not
just who, but what wakes up? Because Bedford didn't just
(07:18):
leave behind a body, He left behind a whole world.
In nineteen sixty seven, there were no personal computers, no internet,
no smartphones. The moon landing hadn't even happened yet. Now
imagine opening your eyes into a world of artificial intelligence,
digital identities and realities that exist entirely online. How do
(07:40):
you even process that? And everybody you've ever known is
already gone, all your cultural references, everything normal to you,
every expectation erased and replaced. You are, in every way
a time traveler with no way back. So the question
is not just can we bring somebody back, but should we?
(08:04):
Who would this person even be? What would their life consist?
Of those five hundred plus frozen bodies are simply waiting,
betting on a future that may never pay off. Really,
what makes this story so powerful is that it isn't
really about science. It's about being human, refusing to accept
(08:24):
the finality of death. The belief, however, slim, that tomorrow
might hold answers that today does not. Professor Bedford didn't
know if it would work, but he took the long shot,
and nearly sixty years later, he's still waiting on ice,
somewhere between what was and what might be. So the
(08:46):
next time you have those existential thoughts about the future,
about what might eventually be possible, remember this Somewhere in
a chamber filled with liquid nitrogen, a man from nineteen
sixty seven is still sort of holding on waiting, and
one day we may find out if that wait was
(09:08):
worth it. Hope you're enjoying The Backstory with Patty Steele.
Please leave a review and follow or subscribe for free
to get new episodes delivered automatically. Also feel free to
dm me if you have a story you'd like me
to cover. On Facebook, It's Patty Steele and on Instagram
Real Patty Steele. I'm Patty Steele. The Backstory is a
(09:38):
production of iHeartMedia, Premiere Networks, the Elvis Duran Group, and
Steel Trap Productions. Our producer is Mike Pieseglia. Our writer
is Jake Kushner. New episodes are out every Tuesday and Friday,
and feel free to reach out to me with comments
and story suggestions on Instagram at reel Patty Steele and
on Facebook at Patty Steele. Thanks for listening to the
(09:59):
back Story with Patty Steele. The pieces of history you
didn't know you needed to know.
Host
Patty Steele
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