SKYE
Yesterday (11/06) was a day of agony and ecstasy for me. The latter because of the salvation of America by the American people electing Donald Trump in an overwhelming landslide. The former because that is when I learned that my dearest friend whom I loved and admired like a hero brother for over 50 years had suddenly died.
TTPers knew him as Skye, his nickname and pen name. I knew him as Durk – Durk Pearson, a super-genius of almost unimaginable brain power. He loved writing Skye’s Links every Thursday for TTP. Now there will never be another for he is no more. I’d like to tell you about this extraordinary man and what he achieved to the benefit of millions all over the world.
This may not be easy for me as, frankly, I am still in a state of shock. Every Friday morning before I started the HFR, I’d give him a call. We’d talk about the week’s events, but also about all kinds of science topics, funny jokes we’d heard, just plain buddy talk, a fun yet intensely informative conversation usually lasting about an hour and a-half. Both of us really looked forward to it every week. It really hurts that there will be no such call tomorrow morning. With that said, here we go.
I first met Durk when he was a graduate student in physics at UCLA in early 1966. He was 22, had recently married a biochemistry grad student named Sandy, and had a crew cut back then. At the time, I was State Chairman of Youth For Reagan during Reagan’s first political campaign, for Governor of California. One of the fellows in YFR was an incredibly bright guy with an IQ of 180 named Dennis Turner, also in physics at UCLA. Dennis told me, “You think I’m smart – there’s a Bruin friend of mind who leaves me in the dust, you’ve got to meet him. He went to MIT where they were unable to measure his IQ.”
We all got together a few times, but then Durk was hired by a major defense contractor, TRW, to design laser guidance systems for ICBMs among much else, while after the campaign I ended up at the University of Hawaii studying philosophy. Dennis moved to Manhattan to start a commodity trading business. By early 1976 I had my Philosophy Ph.D. from USC and had written a book, The Adventurer’s Guide.
I came to New York to finish the editing with my publisher, McKay Books, staying with Dennis and his wife Ava at their brownstone in Brooklyn. Dennis said, “Remember Durk Pearson? He and Sandy are coming to visit.” Every evening for several days we’d all talk for hours, and it began to really click. Durk was fascinated by my becoming a professional adventurer, while I was fascinated by him and Sandy explaining their concepts of what they called “life extension,” the “free radical theory of aging, and “antioxidants.”
That summer I was all over the South Pacific. I spent time with a cannibal tribe called the Nambas on the island of Malekula in the New Hebrides (now Vanuatu). I brought back a stone axe to give to Durk and Sandy. Durk showed it to his scientist team at TRW, who wanted to know how old it was, how many hundreds or thousands of years old. When Durk explained it was a weapon used by a tribe right now in the South Pacific, he told me with a laugh, “They didn’t know how to compute that there were people fighting with stone axes while they were designing intercontinental ballistic missiles with nuclear warheads.”
By the Fall, I started doing talk shows to promote my book, such as Johnny Carson and Merv Griffin. I was living in Vegas by then, so every time I went to LA to do a show, I’d come over to Durk and Sandy’s place in Manhattan Beach. They had set up a laboratory in the loft above their garage where they would mix up various life extension/antioxidant formulas they were inventing. I was blown away.
By 1977, I had been on Merv’s show so often that he had me on as co-host for any adventure-theme show such as with Jacques Cousteau, Thor Heyerdahl, or Lowell Thomas. Once a year, Merv did his show not at his LA studio but at the Riviera Hotel in Vegas. Merv invited me to dinner – I brought my fiancée Jacqueline Vial, the star showgirl of the Folies Bergère, Merv brought Eva Gabor.
While Jacqueline and Eva were engaged in animated French, I told Merv I had to tell him about a friend of mine. Of course, everyone is always buttonholing Merv about a “friend” who should be on his show, but I felt compelled.
“Merv, this friend of mine went to MIT where they measured his IQ, like all incoming freshmen. He went off the top of it. Okay, this is MIT and this happens every so often, so they have another IQ test that starts where the first one stops. He went off the top of that one, too. Never happened before. The highest extrapolatable limit is an IQ of 220. They gave him a bunch of tests and finally decided they had no idea how high his IQ was, maybe around 240. MIT had never seen an intelligence like his.” I had Merv’s attention, – and continued.
“The thing is, it’s not just being a super-genius. He has this uncanny ability to explain absolutely anything, from how a refrigerator works to Einstein’s Relativity or subatomic quantum mechanics so clearly. Or why do we get old? What simple, effective, and inexpensive things people in your audience can do to actually start slowing down the aging process in their bodies – explaining how they work with visual metaphors anyone in your audience can understand. Something tells me that if you put him on your show, he will blow your audience away.”
A little shaken, Merv replied, “Wow – well, okay Jack, I’ll have Peter give him a call”. That would be Peter Barsocchini, Merv’s chief booking guy. I said, “No, no, you can’t do that! With a world class brain comes world class eccentricity. He’s a virtual hermit, no one knows his real name except for where he works and a few friends like me. Only I am so crazy to think of this, which I did just now; the thought of him going on national television is bizarre. I’ve got to talk to him and see if I can persuade him.”
Merv was seriously puzzled. “Okay, Jack, never heard of anything like this, so let me know.”
Couple of weeks later I’m spending the evening at Durk and Sandy’s, where I blurt out, “Durk… I have a question. What would you think of going on the Merv Griffin Show?” He looked at me with scorn. “Why would I want to do that?” I said, “You know, all I can say is that something tells me if you went on the show and talked like we do here about life extension, free radicals, antioxidants, how to live longer, you’d blow his audience away. Nobody knows about what you’re thinking on all this, it’s unknown. I’m sure of this.”
He was unconvinced. “I don’t know, Jack, sounds like a waste of time, what can come of it? I don’t think so.” I was frustrated and upset. Finally I said, “You know, Durk, they’ll pay you 400 dollars.” His eyes widened. “They will? 400 dollars just for going on some show and talking?” 400 dollars in 1977 went a lot further than it does now. “Yep, that’s what I get every time, four hundred bucks.” He looked over at Sandy and nodded. “Hmmm… well, maybe…”
I seized the moment, “Okay… so Durk, do I have your permission to give Merv’s booking guy Peter Barsocchini your phone number so he can set up an interview with you?” It took him a couple of seconds, then he said, “Yes.”
That one “Yes” changed the lives of millions for the better, although we had no idea of that at the time.
Now I had to call Peter and brief him. “Listen, buddy, you’re among the very best at interviewing the most interesting people on the planet. But I’ve got tell you, you’ve never ever talked to anyone like this – you’ll think you’re on a different planet. Durk Pearson really does have a 240 IQ and is superhumanly articulate about anything. Just have fun.”
After spending a few hours at Durk and Sandy’s the next day, Peter called me up. “Jack, you were absolutely right. My brain is in complete overwhelm. We’re putting him on.”
After the first show, with Merv introducing him simply as “Scientist Durk Pearson,” Merv called to thank me: “Jack, what’s amazing is he’s never been on television in his life, and with all the cameras, lights, live audience, millions of people watching, he’s completely un-selfconscious, completely at ease. As I said on the air, I could ask him anything and out comes this amazingly clear articulate answer. We’re putting him back on. I owe you one.”
Durk’s second appearance, I was in the audience to watch. Merv says, “Our next guest is Scientist Durk Pearson, who was introduced to us by our friend Dr. Jack Wheeler – who’s in the audience. Jack, come on up and join us!” Startled, I clambered up and participated. At the end of the session, Merv asks, “Durk, how can people learn more about what you’re talking about?” Durk responds, “Well, I can put together a list of resources, peer-reviewed science journal reports.” Merv looks into the camera and says, “Okay folks, write in and we’ll send you Durk Pearson’s personal source list for life extension.”
Two weeks or so later, – this would be early 1978, – Merv calls me up. “Jack, what have you done to me!?” I say I don’t know, what have I done? “Jack, the most letters regarding any guest in the years I’ve had my show was about 600. Jack – every corridor in our offices is lined with huge sacks of mail asking for Durk’s list. Jack, there must be tens of thousands of letters! Bills aren’t getting paid. It’s total chaos here and this is all your fault!” We laughed and laughed, really belly-laughed.
Durk was on Merv’s show some 30 times, more than I was. In his autobiography. Merv: Making the Good Life Last, he notes: “Durk Pearson was the single most popular guest we ever had in the history of our show.”
The result was Durk & Sandy’s 2 million hardcover copy runaway bestseller, Life Extension: A Practical Scientific Approach Adding Years to Your Life and Life to Your Years
The entire life extension movement was launched to become a multi-billion dollar anti-aging nutritional supplement industry because Durk said “Yes” to my asking if Peter Barsocchini could give him a call.
And more. Durk & Sandy saved the entire nutritional supplement industry by winning the war being waged against it by the FDA, determined to make many of the supplements you and millions of others take today illegal:
Their formulas have kept me healthy for over 40 years. The best source today is Life Priority, operated by my friends Greg and Michelle Pryor. The quality is unmatched.
Many years ago, Durk & Sandy left California to settle in Tonopah, Nevada where they lived quietly and happily until Sandy came down with a malady that even Durk with his heroic efforts proved impossible to overcome. After being Durk’s life partner for 57 years, Sandy passed on March 12, 2022. Durk never fully recovered from the loss.
Durk loved TTP. He remains our Forum champion, having posted 6,783 comments filled with brilliant wisdom and insights. Every Friday morning like clockwork we’d have our pre-HFR call unless I was on an expedition, as I was last week in the Himalayas. Yet his loss of Sandy took a steady toll on his immune system. He came down with a stomach infection that he couldn’t shake. It exploded into sepsis. By the time his friends medevacked him to the hospital in Reno it was too late. Durk passed on Sunday, October 27.
It seems so impossible, so surreal, so hard to accept and cope with, yet it is reality. It is not going to be easy for me to get up tomorrow morning, always looking forward excitedly for so many years to my Friday morning call with Durk, and realize it can’t be and never will be ever again.
There will never be another Durk Pearson, with his superhuman intelligence, his love for freedom and love for America, who did so much for so many. It was such an honor and privilege to be his friend.
References:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Durk_Pearson
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sandy_Shaw_(writer)
https://www.lifeextension.com/magazine/1999/7/interview
A brief history and summary of Durk Pearson and Sandy Shaw’s First Amendment victory over the FDA.