Alcor Patient Profile: Wesley Du Charme

Wesley du Charme

Born April 3rd, 1939. Cryopreserved April 15, 2010

Wesley du Charme, a member for nearly 14 years, was diagnosed with end-stage pancreatic cancer after battling brain cancer for an extended period of time. After determining that additional treatments would be futile and the time required for treatments would only reduce the likelihood he would be well enough for travel, Wes and his wife packed their bags and flew to Arizona. The flight was challenging for Wes, given his condition, but he said that getting close to Alcor was worth the effort.

Wes was admitted to Hospice of the Valley and after five days as an inpatient, Wes took a turn for the worse. Having just completed another cryopreservation, Alcor was back on standby with little recuperation time. On April 15th, 2010, about 30 hours after the previous Alcor patient was pronounced, Wes became Alcor’s 94th patient. The Alcor standby team was on-site and began stabilization immediately upon pronouncement, arriving at Alcor with the patient only 32 minutes later.

A Member Profile was published in 2008, reproduced below.


Alcor Member Profile
From Cryonics 1st Quarter 2008

By Chana Phaedra

Wes Du Charme dedicated his early life to understanding how people work together. After obtaining a Ph.D. in Experimental Psychology from the University of Michigan in 1969 he entered the field of industrial and organizational (I/O) psychology, which seeks to influence productivity and satisfaction in the workplace by utilizing psychological theories and research methods. It was with the logical mindset required of such an occupation that Wes first read K. Eric Drexler’s book, Engines of Creation, in 1990. Though he had heard of cryonics before, he had never seriously considered it for more than a few moments. Confronted with Drexler’s evidence for the inevitability of human manipulation of matter at the molecular scale, Wes recalls that, “suddenly, cryonics made sense.”

Wes Du Charme
Wes with his wife, Ida, who is also an Alcor member.

And suddenly, Wes was on a mission. As a researcher and writer who had “always been interested in what the future will hold,” Wes embarked on a quest to inform himself and others of the possibilities for dramatically extended lifespan. After extensive investigation into both nanotechnology and cryonics, and six months devoted to writing, Wes published a book in 1995 called Becoming Immortal: Nanotechnology, You, and the Demise of Death about nanotechnology-driven possibilities for extending life and resuscitating cryonics patients. Motivated by his desire to live a long life and see the future and to obtain credibility as the author of a book about cryonics, Wes joined the cryonics experiment as an Alcor member that same year.

Wes Du Charme
Wes jokingly regards the cold Idaho winters as a cryonics training program.

I/O psychologists are by definition interested in organizational or group behavior, and Wes’s concerns about the future of cryonics leave no question that he is intensely interested in the underlying psychological issues surrounding the subject. He wonders, why do some see so clearly, and thus feel so passionately, the need for cryonics while others so easily dismiss it? Worse still, why do so few people accept rational arguments in favor of cryonics? “Obviously,” Wes declares, “we would all be safer if cryonics were more popular. We are all more at risk because the idea is not well known and is not well accepted. There are many ways things can go astray even in the best of circumstances.”

The answer to this problem: membership growth. “I think significantly increasing our membership is the key to almost everything else. More members would translate into more dollars, which would allow us to develop along many fronts including publicity, marketing, lobbying, and research. Now, if I only knew how to increase membership!”

By his own admission, his efforts at recruiting more Alcor members, even after having written a book on the subject, have been less than stellar. “I was already married by the time I first learned about cryonics, and my wife became interested through me.” Unfortunately, other than his wife Ida, none of his friends or family have become members, keeping a safe distance in the camp of the “generally supportive.” Wes feels that Alcor should devote more of its energy and resources toward marketing to encourage growth because “a larger organization has more clout, more resources, and more options for its members.”

Now retired from his job in academia, his leisure activities include reading, keeping up with nanotechnological developments, and playing tennis several times a week. He also serves on committees in the small town of Rathdrum, Idaho, and is currently president of “Friends of Rathdrum Mountain,” a conservation group in the area.

Wes Du Charme
Wes sharing time with his mother and wife.

Perhaps his most ambitious pastime over the past three years has been running a website (Decision Time Tools) designed to help other retirees find interesting new leisure activities. The site uses questionnaire/profile matching to direct customers to the most appropriate leisure activities from a database of over 1200 activities.

His background in psychology and interest in cryonics have taught him that “living a healthy, happy lifestyle might add significantly more than just a few months or years to my lifespan.” By doing what he can to extend healthy lifespan now, Wes hopes to take advantage of medical advances that will significantly improve that capability in the future. Speaking most fondly of his favorite hobby, singing in a barbershop group, Wes chuckles, “We always say that barbershoppers live, on average, seven years longer than the rest of the population. I’m not sure that’s true, but I’ll take every bit of help I can get!”

Wes Du Charme
Wes (second from left) prepares to deliver a singing valentine with his barber shop quartet.