Who was the tallest human on earth?

This famous man died at the age of 22 in 1940. Because of his height he had some problems with his legs but never used a wheelchair. The disease, though, didn't prevent him from becoming a celebrity as he reached 8 ft 11 in! He started to grow since the moment he was born: at the age of 8 he was 5 ft 11 in. According to the modern data, such an anomaly was caused by hyperplasia.

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57 Comments

Carolyn Cater

His shoe is on display in my hometown at a local shoe shop. We grew up with stories about him.

Jacqueline Tattam

‘He started to grow since the moment he was born”......wow...how unusual..🙄

Brian Chesney

too painful for him to play sports but all stories indicate a very sweet gentle man

Pedro Ólafsson Riba

hyperplasia of the hypophysis,in the turkish saddel,in the middle and on the bottom of the brain.Acromegalia the name of the disease.

earlepg

I was was disappointed when I stopped growing 1/8-th of an inch short of 6 feet, but I certainly had no aspirations for getting that tall. (I'm even shorter now; surprise, surprise.)

Mike Reidy

Robert Pershing Wadlow, 8’11.1”

ToniP

Jacqueline Tattam, indeed.

JohnnyRoulette

When I was a kid we went to Gatlinburg Tennessee and there was a Guinness Museum there. They had a replica of his kitchen. What got me was that Count Desmond was there. He was a record-holding sword swallower. 7 swords at once I think it was. He was doing it outside on the sidewalk. I still don’t know how one does that. I kept trying to do it with a butter knife for weeks after that. No luck