World Records
World Championship Sardine Packing Contest
The World Championship Sardine Packing Contest was launched in 1970 in Rockland, Maine. But by 1990 the contest had fizzled out, due largely to an inability to find anyone willing to compete in it. This reflected the decline of the sardine packing industry in the region, as well a shift to mechanization.
The contest in 1972. Source: facebook
Circa 1971. Source: Digital Maine
Five-time champion Rita Willey became known as "the Mahammad Ali of all sardine packers." There's an exhibit honoring her in the Maine Coast Sardine History Museum. According to the museum:
image source: Maine Travel Maven
Evidently there must still be sardine packing contests held on occasion, though no longer in Rockland. The video below shows a 2005 contest sponsored by the Canadian firm Connors.
Posted By: Alex - Mon Jun 29, 2020 -
Comments (3)
Category: Sports, World Records, Fish
Niralamba Purna Chakrasana World Record
World records for extreme yoga moves. Youth evidently confers a big advantage in being able to do this. It would be even more impressive to see this done by someone over 60.This move looks like its straight out of The Exorcist.
Posted By: Alex - Wed Mar 18, 2020 -
Comments (1)
Category: Exercise and Fitness, World Records
World’s Largest Yo-Yo, 1974
Back in 1974, MIT Professor James Williams led students in creating the world's largest yo-yo. From the MIT Black History site:Williams was offered $5,000 for the yo-yo by a Las Vegas casino (“I feel sensitive about selling it”), and laughed off suggestions that he drop it from Canada’s tallest structure, Toronto’s 1,800-foot Canadian National Tower. “There were all sorts of radio and TV offers,” he says wearily.
Arizona Daily Star - Feb 5, 1974
The record no longer stands. According to Guinness, the current record holder is Beth Johnson who, in 2012, successfully tested a yo-yo measuring 11 ft 10.75 in diameter and weighing 4,620 lb.
Posted By: Alex - Mon Feb 24, 2020 -
Comments (3)
Category: World Records, 1970s
Happy Humphrey, Heaviest Pro Wrestler of All Time
His Wikipedia page.
Posted By: Paul - Sat Jan 18, 2020 -
Comments (0)
Category: Body, Dieting and Weight Loss, Differently Abled, Handicapped, Challenged, and Otherwise Atypical, Enlargements, Miniatures, and Other Matters of Scale, Excess, Overkill, Hyperbole and Too Much Is Not Enough, World Records, Wrestling, Twentieth Century
Edmund Love and His Restaurant Quest
In 1964, THE SATURDAY EVENING POST profiled Edmund G. Love, who intended to eat his way through approximately 5000 NYC restaurants.
By 1973, when THE NEW YORK TIMES took notice, his quest had ballooned to 6000.
His 1990 obituary in the NYT says he managed to hit 1750 of them.
Posted By: Paul - Thu Nov 07, 2019 -
Comments (4)
Category: Addictions, Bums, Hobos, Tramps, Beggars, Panhandlers and Other Streetpeople, Eccentrics, Food, Restaurants, World Records, Twentieth Century
Champion Chicken Picker Ernest Hausen
Ernie Hausen, of Fort Atkinson, Wisconsin, had one great talent. He could pick the feathers off of chickens really, really fast.When he started picking chickens, in 1904, it took him a full half hour to defeather one. Since he was paid 5 cents per chicken, he wasn't making much money. Over the years he sped up. By 1922, he won a Chicken Picking Championship by picking his chicken clean in 6 seconds. He topped this in 1939, upping his time to 3.5 seconds. As far as I know, that record stands to this day.
His technique:
-Ithaca Journal - Feb 7, 1946
More info: Hoard Museum
Wisconsin State Journal - Jan 2, 1946
Appleton Post-Crescent - Jul 28, 1936
McAllen Monitor - Oct 28, 1946
Posted By: Alex - Fri Sep 27, 2019 -
Comments (1)
Category: Animals, Farming, Human Marvels, World Records
Vasectomy World Record
As far as I can tell, the world record for the most voluntary vasectomies performed in a single day (and at a single event) was set on December 5, 1987 in Bangkok, when 1214 men received the operation. This beat the previous record of 1202, set in 1983.Interesting how the article specifies these were voluntary vasectomies. Is there a separate record for involuntary ones?
Anyway, 'most vasectomies' appears to be a category that Guinness doesn't bother to cover.
Des Moines Register - Dec 6, 1987
Posted By: Alex - Mon Aug 19, 2019 -
Comments (1)
Category: World Records, Surgery
Thirteen Daughters, Then a Boy
I wonder if this 1953 record has ever been broken?Story here.
Posted By: Paul - Tue Jul 23, 2019 -
Comments (2)
Category: Family, Children, World Records, 1950s
Avengers: Endgame, 200 times
Back in April, I posted about a guy who had set a world record for “most cinema productions attended - same film.” Specifically, he had watched Captain Marvel in a movie theater 116 times.Since Marvel films have, for some reason, inspired these super-fan stunts, I speculated that the then imminent release of Avengers: Endgame would lead to a new attempt at a record. And sure enough, Agustin Alanis of Riverview, Florida is going for it. I believe he's already set a new record, but since Avengers: Endgame is still in theaters, he's still watching it, and is shooting for a total of 200 viewings. This is especially impressive since the movie clocks in at around 3 hours.
Posted By: Alex - Sun Jun 23, 2019 -
Comments (1)
Category: Movies, World Records
World record for most severed hands reattached in one week
As far as I can tell, their claim to this record remains unchallenged.
Palm Beach Post - Nov 1, 1997
Posted By: Alex - Sun May 26, 2019 -
Comments (1)
Category: World Records, Surgery, 1990s
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| Alex Boese Alex is the creator and curator of the Museum of Hoaxes. He's also the author of various weird, non-fiction, science-themed books such as Elephants on Acid and Psychedelic Apes. Paul Di Filippo Paul has been paid to put weird ideas into fictional form for over thirty years, in his career as a noted science fiction writer. He has recently begun blogging on many curious topics with three fellow writers at The Inferior 4+1. Contact Us |