Alcor Life Extension Foundation

The Alcor Life Extension Foundation, most often referred to as Alcor, is an American nonprofit, federally tax-exempt, 501(c)(3) organization based in Scottsdale, Arizona, United States. Alcor advocates for, researches, and performs cryonics, the freezing of human corpses and brains in liquid nitrogen after legal death, with hopes of resurrecting and restoring them to full health if the technology to do so becomes available in the future. Cryonics is regarded with skepticism within the scientific community and has been characterized as quackery and pseudoscience.

, Alcor had 1,927 members, including 222 who have died and whose corpses have been subject to cryonic processes; 116 bodies had only their head preserved. Alcor also applies its cryonic process to the bodies of pets. , there were 33 animal bodies preserved.

History

The organization was established as a nonprofit organization by Fred and Linda Chamberlain in California in 1972 as the Alcor Society for Solid State Hypothermia. Alcor was named after a faint star in the Big Dipper. The name was changed to Alcor Life Extension Foundation in 1977. The organization was conceived as a rational, technology-oriented cryonics organization that would be managed on a fiscally conservative basis. Alcor advertised in direct mailings and offered seminars in order to attract members and bring attention to the cryonics movement. The first of these seminars attracted 30 people.

On July 16, 1976, Alcor performed its first human cryopreservation on Fred Chamberlain's father. That same year, research in cryonics began with initial funding provided by the Manrise Corporation. At that time, Alcor's office consisted of a mobile surgical unit in a large van. Trans Time, Inc., a cryonics organization in the San Francisco Bay area, provided initial preservation procedures and long-term storage until Alcor began doing its own storage in 1982.

In 1977, articles of incorporation were filed in Indianapolis by the Institute for Advanced Biological Studies (IABS) and Soma, Inc. IABS was a nonprofit research startup led by a young cryonics enthusiast named Steve Bridge, while Soma was intended as a for-profit organization to provide cryopreservation and human storage services. Its president, Mike Darwin, subsequently became a president of Alcor. Bridge filled the same position many years later. IABS and Soma relocated to California in 1981. Soma was disbanded, while IABS merged with Alcor in 1982.

Increasing growth in membership during this period is partially attributed to the 1986 publication of Eric Drexler's Engines of Creation, which debuted the idea of nanotechnology and contained a chapter on cryonics. and one in 1989. At that time, Alcor owned 20% interest in Symbex, with a goal of 51% ownership. In September 1988, Leary announced that he had signed up with Alcor, becoming the first celebrity to become an Alcor member. Leary later switched to a different cryonics organization, CryoCare, and then changed his mind altogether. Alcor's vice-president, director, head of suspension team and chief surgeon, Jerry Leaf, died suddenly of a heart attack in 1991.

By 1990, Alcor had grown to 300 members and outgrown its California headquarters, which was the largest cryonics facility in the world. The organization wanted to remain in Riverside County, and in 2013, that publication reported that he intends to be cryopreserved himself.

Policies and procedures

Most Alcor members fund cryonic preservation through life insurance policies which name Alcor as the beneficiary.

Corpses are transported as quickly as possible to Alcor headquarters in Scottsdale, where they undergo final preparations in Alcor's cardiopulmonary bypass lab. In the Patient Care Bay they are monitored by computer sensors while kept in liquid nitrogen in dewars. Riverside County, California deputy coroner Dan Cupido said that Alcor had better equipment than some medical facilities.

Membership dues cover one-third of Alcor's yearly budget, with donations and case income from cryopreservations covering the rest. Alcor receives $50,000 each year from television royalties donated by sitcom writer and producer Richard C. Jones who is in suspension.

Living clients

Living clients include Robert G. Miller, Paris Hilton, Peter Thiel and others.

Stored corpses

Stored corpses include those of Dick Clair, an Emmy Award-winning television sitcom writer and producer, Hall of Fame baseball legend Ted Williams and his son John Henry Williams, and futurist FM-2030.

Corpse storage has grown at a rate of about eight percent a year since Alcor's inception, The oldest stored body (by age at decease) is a 101-year-old woman, and the youngest is a 2-year-old girl. Alcor has had customers from Australia. One in four of its customers reside(d) in the San Francisco Bay Area.

Cases and controversies

Dora Kent

Before the company moved to Arizona from Riverside, California, in 1994, it became a center of controversy when a county coroner ruled that Alcor client Dora Kent (Alcor board member Saul Kent's mother) was murdered with barbiturates before her head was removed for preservation by the company's staff. Alcor contended that the drug was administered after her death. No charges were ever filed; former Riverside County deputy coroner Alan Kunzman later said that this was due to mistakes and poor decision-making by others in his office.

A judge ruled that Kent was already deceased at the time of preservation, and no foul play was involved. Alcor sued the county for false arrest and illegal seizure and won both suits. While Williams' children Claudia and John Henry contended that Williams wished to be preserved at Alcor, their half-sister and oldest Williams child Bobby-Jo Ferrell contested that her father wished to be cremated. John Henry later said, "He was very into science and believed in new technology and human advancement and was a pioneer. Even though things seemed impossible at times, he always knew there was always a chance to catch a fish – only if you had your fly in the water." Alcor denied the allegations of missing DNA.

John Henry Williams subsequently died of leukemia, and his remains are also stored at Alcor. After John Henry's death, Ferrell again filed a lawsuit, but representatives of Williams' estate repeated that he wished to be at Alcor.

Mary Robbins lawsuit

Mary Robbins, a woman living in Colorado Springs, Colorado, signed up with Alcor in 2006, naming the organization as the beneficiary of a $50,000 annuity to cover the harvesting and storage expense. When she was diagnosed with advanced cervical cancer in December 2009, she contacted Alcor to let them know. The company instructed her to move to Alcor's headquarters in Phoenix, Arizona, due to the "lengthy list of after-death protocols that the company requires to prep the body for freezing, including administering a cocktail of medications". Because Robbins's hospice was not able to carry out these procedures, her family said that she changed the beneficiary of the annuity from Alcor to her family. After a Colorado probate court judge ruled in favor of Alcor, they reached a settlement in which Alcor renounced claims on the annuity in exchange for Robbins's remains.