James Baquet

    Having met the person who lived the longest, let’s meet the one who lived the tallest.

    According to the “Guinness World Records” book and website, that honor belongs to an American named Robert Pershing Wadlow (1918-1940). The “irrefutable evidence” shows that Wadlow was an unbelievable 8 feet 11.1 inches (2.72 meters) when measured just three weeks or so before he died. His coffin was 10 feet 9 inches (3.28 meters) long!

    The most he ever weighed, at age 21, was 490 pounds (222.71 kilograms), though he had gone back down to 438 pounds (199 kilograms) at the time of his death a year or so later. To maintain his weight he ate about 8,000 calories a day.

    His feet were 18.5 inches (47 centimeters) long, and his hands 12.75 inches (32.4 centimeters) from the wrist to the tip of the middle finger. When he stretched his arms he measured 9 feet 5.75 inches (2.88 meters) from fingertip to fingertip!

    Because he was born and raised in the city of Alton, Illinois, Wadlow was variously called the “Alton Giant” and the “Giant of Illinois.” By the age of eight, he was taller than his father, who was “only” 5 feet 11 inches (180 centimeters). Because of a problem in his pituitary gland, he continued to produce human growth hormone throughout his tragically short life. All evidence is, had he lived longer, he would have continued to grow.

    But in his last years he was wearing leg braces, and had no feeling in his legs. One of his braces was improperly fitted, which led to an infected blister. It was this infection (aggravated by an autoimmune disorder) that killed Wadlow, though he had suffered declining health through the last year of his life.

    In his last few years he capitalized to some extent on his great height. He toured with a circus and promoted the International Shoe Company, which provided him with outsized shoes free of charge. Some of these, along with life-sized statues of Wadlow, are still on display in various places in the United States today.

    Vocabulary:

    Which word above means:

    1. problem in which a body attacks its own parts

    2. box in which a body is buried

    3. bigger than usual

    4. unable to be denied

    5. small organ that controls all hormones in the body

    6. took advantage of, profited by

    7. made worse, intensified

    8. unit of heat or food energy

    9. thin, water-filled “bubble” on the skin

    10. chemical in the body that affects the function of tissues and organs