Cryonics is the practice or technique of deep-freezing the bodies of people who have just died, in the hope that scientific advances may allow them to be revived in the future. For Trygve Bauge, the death of his grandfather opened a door for him to pilot cryonics. Today, he is legendary, and oddly celebrated annually as “Frozen Dead Guy Days.”
Bredo Morstøl was born in 1900 in a small town near one of western Norway’s ice fjords. He married and had a daughter, Aud, in 1930, and lived a relatively uninteresting life.
In 1975, Bredo suffered a heart attack during a six-mile ski trip where he almost died, but Aud was able to massage his chest and revive him. Though he recovered, he remained weak and settled into a sedentary lifestyle.
On the first Monday in November 1989, Bredo Morstøl passed away during a nap. Aud called her son, 31-year-old Trygve Bauge, who had been living in Colorado for the past 10 years. Trygve was well known in Boulder County, and was described as a lovable, long-bearded eccentric.
Trygve Bauge even started a tradition in Boulder – the New Years Polar Bear Plunge. He began taking leaps into frigid waters, and over the years, the act has become a tradition celebrated by hundreds.
For Trygve, the death of his grandfather was an opportunity. A case where he could pilot freezing the dead, with hope they could later be reanimated. He had his grandfather’s corpse brought to the United States where it was preserved on dry ice until it could be stored in liquid nitrogen at the Trans Time cryonics facility in San Leandro, California.
Bredo’s body remained at the cryonics facility from 1990 until 1993, when Bredo again had his body transported, preserved with dry ice, to Nederland, Colorado. There, he had his mother Aud, planned to create a cryonics facility of their own.
Unfortunately, Trygve was only in the United States on a 10-year-work visa, and when it expired, he was deported, leaving his mother to handle the cryonics.
Aud did her best, keeping her father frozen in a shack behind her unfinished home. Unfortunately, her home had no electricity or plumbing and was in violation of local ordinances, leading her to be evicted.
That’s when she reached out to a local reporter for help. She told the reporter about her father’s body, and of two others. She expressed her fears that her eviction would cause their bodies to thaw. The reporter went to city hall.
It didn’t seem to make a difference. Aud was found guilty by a jury of building-use and zoning violations. The Nederland town judge ordered her to remove her father’s frozen body by March 6, or face 10 days in jail and a $600 fine.
The city had to add a new provision to their municipal code, Section 7-34, “Keeping of bodies”, outlawing the keeping of “the whole or any part of the person, body or carcass of a human being or animal or other biological species which is not alive upon any property”.
The whole story had gained so much publicity, the town made an exception for Bredo, a grandfather clause naming him a Nederland resident. Trygve was able to secure the services of Delta Tech, a local environmental company to keep their cryonic facility running.
In 1995, the local Tuff Shed supplier, and a Denver radio station built a new shed for the purpose of storing Bredo.
Starting 2002, the town began to celebrate “Grandpa Bredo,” in an event known as “Frozen Dead Guy Days.” The celebration is typically celebrated on the second weekend of March and includes activities such as coffin races, a hearse parade, and even “Frozen Dead Guy” look-alike contests. For a time, you could even take a trip to visit his shed.
Over the years, the event has gained traction, with attendance growing each year, with an estimated 25,000 visitors in 2019. Due to Covid, the event was canceled in March 2020, but has since returned in 2022. But the problems didn’t end there. In 2023, due to the rising costs of event space in addition to complaints from residents and businesses, Nederland made the decision to cancel Frozen Dead Guy Days on November 2, 2022.
But, you can’t keep a dead guy down. Just one day after Nederland announced the cancellation of the event, the town of Estes Park, located 44 miles north of Nederland, bought the rights to the festival. Or more specifically, John Cullen, owner of the infamous Stanley Hotel, bought the rights. Moreso, Cullen is working to persuade Trygve to allow him to move Grandpa Bredo to Estes Park.
Estes Park’s first annual Frozen Dead Guy Days is set for the weekend of March 17 – 19.
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