James Bedford Day Date in the current year: January 12, 2026

Cryopreservation is the process of freezing biological materials, such as cells, tissues, or organs, at extremely low temperatures to preserve them over an extended period. It is most commonly used to transport or store biological samples. However, some people have theorized that cryopreservation could be used to preserve human corpses in hopes of future revival.

The cryopreservation process usually begins cooling the body to prevent decomposition and replacing the blood with cryoprotectant solutions. The next step is rapid cooling (vitrification) to prevent ice crystal formation, followed by gradual cooling to approximately −196 °C using liquid nitrogen, at which point biological activity effectively stops. The body is then stored long-term in an insulated container at this temperature, based on the assumption that future medical technologies might be able to repair cellular damage, reverse the cause of death, and restore function. However, this has not yet been demonstrated in humans.

James Hiram Bedford, a psychology professor at the University of California, was the first person whose body was cryogenically preserved after legal death. After being diagnosed with metastatic kidney cancer, which was untreatable at the time, Bedford arranged for his body to be frozen after his death. He also left $100,000 in his will for cryonics research.

Bedford died on January 12, 1967, from cardiorespiratory arrest secondary to cancer. After his death, chemist Robert Prehoda, physician and biophysicist Dante Brunol, and Cryonics Society of California president Robert Nelson preserved his body. They put Bedford on artificial respiration to minimize brain damage due to a lack of oxygen and replaced his blood with a mixture of Ringer's solution and dimethyl sulfoxide, which was intended to serve as an antifreeze. Then, the body was placed in a capsule with dry ice before being transferred to a liquid nitrogen environment.

Bedford’s body has been stored in several cryonics facilities: first in Phoenix, Arizona, then in two different facilities in California. During this time, much of the $100,000 that Bedford had willed to cryonics research was spent on preserving the body and on legal battles with relatives who insisted that Bedford be thawed and buried. For a few years, Bedford’s son kept his father’s body in a self-storage facility and periodically topped the container with liquid nitrogen to save money. In 1982, Bedford’s body was moved to the Alcor Life Extension Foundation, where it remains under their care.

James Bedford’s body is the only corpse frozen before 1974 that is still cryopreserved today; all others have been thawed and buried. Although it is highly unlikely that he could be resurrected, given that his body was preserved using primitive techniques and his brain is likely damaged beyond repair, some people celebrate January 12 as James Bedford Day to promote cryopreservation research.