Robert Wadlow

Robert Wadlow of Alton, Illinois, was measured at 8 feet 11.1 inches (2.72 m) in June 1940. He died the next month, at age 22, from an infection that began with a blister on his foot. No one has been verified as taller.

His height came from a medical measurement taken shortly before his death. Reports of taller people lack that kind of proof.

Context

Wadlow was born in 1918 to parents of ordinary height. His extreme growth is attributed to an overactive pituitary gland that produced too much growth hormone, a condition that could not be treated effectively in his day. Doctors measured him at 8 feet 11.1 inches in June 1940, shortly before his death.

Because of reduced feeling in his legs, he wore leg braces, and a blister caused by one of them became infected. Without modern antibiotics, the infection led to his death in July 1940. He had worn size 37AA shoes, according to common accounts, and he remained popular in his home town of Alton, where a statue stands in his memory.

Guinness treats him as unmatched because his height was recorded by physicians over many years, whereas other claimed giants rely on inconsistent or unverified measurements. Today, treatments for excess growth hormone mean it is unlikely anyone will grow as tall again.